Career & Life Coaching

Coaching clients in senior roles is often necessary because they lack self confidence.  As a result, they are not seen as leaders.  Instead, they all seem to have one quality in common.  They all have a fear of making the necessary decision required of their position. Self perception affects everyone in both their personal and professional lives.  However, for individuals in positions of authority, it’s important to understand how self confidence impacts your leadership.

Why Self Confidence is Vital in Leadership

People tend to gravitate toward those that possess self confidence. If the supervisor is confident in his/her decisions, the subordinates are more likely to concur. Without this attribute, the internal structure of any business will degrade, as employees start to second-guess the management.  It can lead to strife in the workplace and the loss of valuable human assets.

An individual with self confidence does not know all the answers or “lords it over” employees.  In fact, it’s quite the opposite.  Self-confident leaders build up others and find satisfaction in their workers’ personal and professional growth. Their strength is in helping others become successful.  A person with self confidence is:

*  Able to admit mistakes and learn from them.
*  Able to take risks to achieve more.
*  Able to do what is right, despite the lack of popular opinion.
*  Able to accept compliments graciously.
*  Unwilling to seek out personal accolades.

Self confident leaders are a pleasure to work for, because they are more interested in developing a cohesive and well-ordered work environment.  The employees work well together, stress is minimized, and employees are encouraged to excel and use their strengths to improve productivity and achieve their career goals.

How to Build Self Confidence

Although there is no magic pill for building self confidence and it doesn’t happen overnight, you can achieve this personal and professional goal, if you make the effort. It will not be easy. You will basically have to change the way you think and develop a new personal perspective.

Begin by acknowledging your achievements.  Instead of dwelling on your mistakes, think about all that you have accomplished over the years both personally and professionally.  There is nothing wrong with giving yourself a mental pat on the back. Recognize the effort and hard work it took to get you where you are today.

Next, consider your strengths.  Where do you excel both personally and professionally?  Everyone has areas in which they need to improve.  But, you don’t dwell on your weaknesses.  You concentrate on when you are at your best.

Think about your goals.  What do you want to achieve?  Where do you want to go in your personal life or in the workplace? Consider what you need to do, in order to get there.

Now, it’s time for the really hard part.  In order to build self confidence, you must learn to manage your mind.  Do not dwell on the negative self-talk. It’s time to accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative.  Catch yourself, when you start to dwell on your weaknesses.  Stop.  Then, go back and think about your accomplishments, your strengths, and how you are going to achieve your personal and professional goals.  With practice, you will build the self confidence necessary to excel in leadership within the workplace.

Copyright 2010. Cecile Peterkin. All rights reserved.

Business leadership is not about any single quality so much as it is about a number of qualities that come together to create something much stronger than any of those qualities alone. Business leadership is not so much about managing others and “taking charge” as it is about motivating by example.

So if business leadership is something that is difficult to pin down, what steps can you take so that you will find yourself recognized as a leader in this, the 21st century? What can you do to incorporate the principles of leadership into your life so that you will be able to achieve your goals and rise to the top in your organization or your career field?

One step is to look at those leaders who you admire. Whether you’re inspiration comes from political leaders – those who have been able to unite the people of their country during difficult times – or from leaders within your own field, when you are looking for information that will help you to take on a business leadership role, it’s important to understand what makes someone a leader.

In other words, when you are thinking about business leadership, it’s important to take the time to understand courage, determination, and to learn more about the ways in which leaders speak to those who follow them. Ultimately, what you will find is that by embracing those qualities within yourself, you will be able to persevere and to reach the goals that you have set for yourself and for those who you are working with.

Ultimately, what you are likely to discover is that, in order to differentiate yourself in the 21st century and to take on a business leadership role, you will need to:

• Learn to set aside excuses. The majority of people who are in business find a way to come up with a number of excuses when something that they have been asked to do isn’t done. Leaders, on the other hand, focus on getting the job done.

• Learn the value of making mistakes. When we make mistakes, it’s important to take advantage of the lessons that come out of them so that we can use that knowledge to move forward.

• Learn to lead from within. When you are looking at business leadership characteristics, you’ll see that those who are in a supervisory role are not just watching others and telling them what they do wrong; instead, when they see a problem they jump into the trenches and work with their staff, helping them to solve problems and to find creative solutions.

Business leadership is about working with others and motivating them to do more – to be more. When you’re looking for a way to differentiate yourself from others, one of the best things that you can do is to work well with others, put forth your best effort at all times and to make sure that – at all times – you’re making an effort to bring a team of people together.

Finally, remember this: business leadership is about having a willingness to try something new. To set yourself apart from the crowd, you need to look at the big picture – and then to get everyone else to see it too.

Leadership = Influence.

It is the art or process of influencing people so that they will strive willingly and enthusiastically. As human beings we all influence someone: parent to child, teacher to student, friend to friend, employer to employee, and coach to athlete. If you stop to think about it, the list is endless.

Since we are all capable of influencing others, we all have the potential to be leaders. A leader is not necessarily the person at the head of the table or the one with the title. The next time you are in a meeting or a social function, see how quickly you can tell who the real leader is: it is the person others naturally watch, listen to, gravitate towards, and follow.

Leadership is more than a position. Leadership is a skill. Because we all have areas in which we excel, from time to time we are all thrust into leadership roles. While these opportunities may seem uncomfortable at first, ask yourself a few important questions. Which skills do I have that are being called upon? What do I have to offer? Then, take the opportunity to use these skills to move the situation forward.

Leadership takes time and experience to develop. Take advantage of these opportunities to develop your leadership skills.