Tag: Teamwork

How To Develop Confidence

Achieving Goals, Leadership, Relationships, Success

On the way into work yesterday it was quite misty, but it wasn’t thick enough to be fog. It reminded me of something I heard about how driving in fog is a metaphor for life. Often, when moving forward with a new venture, a new relationship, or anything that takes us out of our comfort zone, we are scared because we don’t know what the future holds. This is like driving in fog when you can only see 10 feet in front of you. The way to get clarity on what is ahead of you is to move forward 10 feet and then you can see the next 10 feet.

The lesson here is that we will never be able to predict the future 100%, but this should not stop us from moving forward. The best strategy is to work on your skillset and learn from your experiences. With skills and experience you can make wiser decisions and you can pivot where needed, depending on what life throws at you. If you trust your car brakes, steering, lights etc, then driving in fog is less stressful because your car and you can handle whatever you come across.

In order to improve your skillset and experience, you have to put in the time to try things out and develop skills. However, confidence also comes from our mindset, we have to believe in ourselves and our abilities or the actions we take will largely be ineffective. This mindset has to be a growth mindset, the ability to be agile and flexible requires it. Having a fixed mindset will cause your confidence to crumble when you hit the realities of life.

So, confidence requires skillset, mindset and experience. A seemingly obvious statement, but we often think of confidence as something we are born with. In reality confidence comes from how we behave on a moment to moment basis.

The final piece to the puzzle of confidence is our environment. If we feel safe enough to try and fail and try again, then our confidence goes up. If failure is treated with rejection, then we will develop a fixed mindset, we won’t believe we can do anything and we will not gain the required experience. This is why we need trusting teams at work, and supportive relationships in our lives. Add together all of these elements and you have the recipe for confidence.

Teams Need A Purpose

Achieving Goals, Happiness, Leadership, Success

In any organisation every team needs a Purpose. Often a company will have an overarching Purpose and/or Values, but if this is either not articulated well or made relevant to every team within the company, then productivity can drop off, as can retention of staff.

Everyone needs a reason to go to work, other than just to pay the bills. If our job gives meaning and purpose to our lives then we will be happier and will work harder for the company we work for. The assumption that staff will only work for a paycheck is a shortsighted view that many leaders have.

So, if you are a leader within your organisation, review how effective your company’s Purpose, Values or Principles are and work to ensure every member of staff feels that they are contributing towards them. This will increase levels of fulfilment and productivity, and will make them want to stay.

Collaborating With Colleagues

Achieving Goals, Leadership, Success, The Pathway To Fulfilment

If you work in a role that means you attend meetings, then there may be times when you lead a project or need to get colleagues on board. Take the example of starting a project. There will be a temptation to decide how it will work, what the vision is for the project and who will take on which role, etc. Sometimes it is your role to decide this. Sometimes it is not. However, this advice will work either way. It may also be useful if you are pitching an idea to colleagues too.

Plan Together

A good way to get your colleagues invested in the project is to involve them in the planning of it from the very start. Some things will be decided by circumstances outside the project, but there will be things that can be discussed and planned together.

Highlight Strengths

Many of your colleagues will have skills and experience that will benefit the project. Highlighting these strengths will make your colleagues feel respected and valued. You could start a Skills Bank where colleagues share their skills and experience and it all get collated and shared amongst the team, so each will know who to go to for specific advice. This could simply be a Word document made available on a shared drive, by email or uploaded to Microsoft Teams.

Listen Before You Speak

If you explain the project and tell everyone what you think, your colleagues will be less likely to contribute. However, if you hold off from giving your opinion and wait to hear everyone else, then they will feel heard and you get the benefit of their opinion before you give yours.