Building Self Confidence at Work- What Skills do you Need?
A client came to me a few months ago because he felt unhappy and stressed at work. Although he'd got a promotion to manager level in an IT company he was beginning to doubt if he was in the right job. Should he take a year off? Should he try something completely different - retrain. Or should he apply somewhere else? He wasn't sure.
When I asked him a few searching questions we found that actually he loved his work and his company was good but he needed more communication skills to help him get the best out of his team and achieve the results he was expected to get. He also needed to get more curious about people and situations instead of feeling he had to react straightaway. I find this happens a lot. People think they need to change a situation when they actually need to get more skills and information.
So I shared with some powerful NLP skills with him that helped him to recognise different communication styles and adapt what he said to get his message across.
Then I showed him a model to help him create win-win outcomes when people had conflicting points of view with each other or himself.
Later we created a problem solving model so he would know the best action to take when difficult issues came up. I taught him some great questions so that he could accurately diagnose a situation before prescibing the action to take.
With every session we're adding to his tool box of communication skills and his confidence and results are improving so now he looks forward to going into work. What's next on our list? Giving difficult feedback so that he can help his team improve while stopping them from getting defensive.
If you'd like to asked some great questions that will give you more clarity, focus and direction, please call Madeleine Morgan for a free consultation on 01223 426392
If you'd like to know more about how to build confidence at work, download my free report at www.buildingselfconfidence.co.uk or my success tips I learned from SCUBA Diving from www.growu.co.uk
I wish you every success,
Warm wishes, Madeleine
How to Stop Procrastinating and Get Motivated
I went to a business networking meeting recently where a business advisor gave a talk on how to overcome procrastination and get things done. The audience enjoyed his entrepreneurial Just-Focus-and-Do-It spirit. I also like the phrase, 'Procrastinate later!'
If it's that simple, why do so many people procrastinate? Is it laziness? Is it that they don't know WHAT to do? Or are there other factors - mindset for instance?
If you look at people who enjoy a lot of personal, career and business success one thing they have in common is their determination to take action. Where others are waiting for the right time and the perfect action, the mindset of the people who get the most done tends to be, 'imperfect action beats perfect inaction every time'. Richard Branson is a great example of this - he wrote a book called, 'Screw it, Let's Do it!' A trait of successful people is that they are prepared to fail hard as well as succeed spectacularly.
It's action that brings the feedback that makes their next attempt more likely to succeed - if they are willing to learn useful things from their experience. A study of millionaires found that the average millionaire goes bankrupt three and a half times. Few people have the determination and tenacity to ride that roller coaster of failure and success. For the ones that do, it's their willingness to review what they did, measure their results, record the lessons learned and change what they are doing that helps them hone their success formula. Few people have been trained or brought up to have that objectivity and discipline. What most people learn after a 'failure' is something useless - don't try again.
A short cut to success is to get a personal, career or business coach to advise, mentor and train you. Someone who has the skills, experience and knowledge to help you reach your goals, the supportive objectivity to help you stand back and assess and who will help you stay motivated to take the next steps. A coach can help you sort out the 20% of action you need to take that will get you 80% of your results. One entrepreneur said, 'Life is too short for me to learn everything I need to know from my mistakes. That's why I have a coach.'
Many people give up when just one more try would bring them the results they are looking for. For instance, research shows that it often takes three to seven times before people are convinced that an idea will work or that a product or service is worth buying, yet many sales people, professionals, managaers, life partners, parents and friends lose the sale or opportunity to influence because they give up after the first or second try. Even fewer people have the confidence to withstand the doubts and criticism of those around them and their own even louder inner critic, when it goes wrong.
This is where a life, career or business coach can help too. They help you take a step back and assess things objectively and help you remain courageous and motivated to keep going. They also have the skill to help you develop more ways to get what you want and the mindset to achieve it. For instancce, you can make more sales, convince people of your point of view and achieve your outcomes more often if you know more ways to communicate with different kinds of people and develop a flexible approach. A life, career or business coach can also help you silence your inner critic - especially an NLP trained coach - and get quality information from your intuition. This is where a life, career or business coach can give you more than someone who just tells you what to do.
Richard Branson and many other people we would consider successful also choose a good team to help them do the things they are not good at or interested in doing. To do that, you first need to know what you are good at. That is where a personality profile can give you shortcuts to the awareness you need. My clients find that the valuable and insightful feedback they get from the FACET5 personality profiling system I use accelerates their personal, career and business success. They get a clear understanding of their strengths and areas for development. They get great clues as to why they procrastinate and what they need to do to take action. One client realised why he procrastinated over people oriented tasks such as networking, presenting his business, meeting new friends and women and dealing with difficult team members. Another discovered why she was putting the wrong sized tasks on her 'To Do' lists. They also realised what kind of people they needed to have around them in their business and personal lives to succeed and experience the rewards they were looking for.
So some keys to getting your 'To Do' lists done are: find out WHAT to do, write lists, find the 20% of tasks that give you the 80% of your results and do them first, delegate to the right people, find out what your strengths are and play to them, measure your results, be flexible about how to achieve your goals, get a life, career or business coach to help you take shortcuts to success and learn positive and useful things from your experience.
I wish you every success in your personal, career and business life, Madeleine
www.growu.co.uk - download more success tips
www.buildingselfconfidence.co.uk - download more confidence tips
Madeleine Morgan runs inspiring, motivating, thought provoking, practical and effective private and public career and business coaching and training programmes in Cambridge and in-house programmes in the UK. She coaches over the telephone, Skype and face-to-face.
How to Gain More Confidence – Who do you turn to for help?
Every one of us feels a lack of confidence at some point in our lives. For some of us it's in a particular area such as public speaking, selling ourselves in business or at a job interview, standing up to aggressive people, asking someone for a date. For some it seems to affect every area of their lives. Before I learned how to be more confident and then became a confidence coach I used to find meeting new people really difficult - I often found myself stuck for what to say.
With all the helping professionals, advice from friends and family and self-help books out there it can be confusing to know who or what to turn to for the most effective help. So here are some ideas to get you started.
Excellent self-help books such as 'I Can Make You Confident' by Paul McKenna are useful for tips and for supporting you when you need a quick burst of inspiration. The limitation of books, CDs etc is that they have to be general and can't deal with your specific limiting beliefs and experience. Some people find that the tips take time, discipline and persistence to implement and that can be difficult to find when you are working on your own, especially if you are surrounded by difficult people who try to undermine you.
One way to deal with the people round you is to make sure that, where you have a choice, you mix with people who are encouraging, supportive and who give you quality feedback. I have some tips on training people to give you quality feedback which I will mention in a future blog entry. Friends, family and colleagues can be encouraging and helpful and these are definitely relationships to nurture. However, they can sometimes be too close to us to be objective. If you lack confidence it's easy to dismiss their encouragement as just 'being nice'. Their advice naturally come from what they would do in a situation which may not fit your personality and skill level. When you hear it you might find yourself saying, 'Yes, but...'
If you there are negative people in your life that, at least for the time being, are permanent fixtures then you may need some guidance as to how to get the best out of them. In fact a big part of gaining confidence is about discovering the skills you need to handle a certain situation such as how to sell effectively, deal with conflict, get the best out of your relationships, say 'No' gracefully and how to choose what you feel. Someone once said that all struggle is a sign of a need for more skill.
Then there are a whole raft of professionals - counsellors, coaches, therapists, NLP practitioners etc. The advantages of going to a good professional are that they are supportive and yet also objective. Your personal development can move faster than if you work on yourself alone. They can help you stay motivated to change, especially at times when you might want to give up. They can deal with you as an individual, with your specific concerns and needs. They can break things down into manageable bit sized chunks so that you get enough to move you on without it being overwhelming. So who do you choose?
All of these professional will have skills that can help you. So here are some things to consider when choosing.
Is this person supportive and yet also able to challenge me enough to move me out of my comfort zone and into the adventure zone?
Do they have the skills to help me clear past negative experiences that we all have and that are holding me back?
Do they have a lot of experience and success with clients with the areas of confidence I want to build?
Do they have recognised qualifications like being a NLP master practitioner accredited by the ABNLP and BBNLP?
Do they know skills that will help you use the confidence you gain effectively? It's no good having the confidence to jump in a plane and fly it if you haven't had flying lessons! So if you need confidence in business networking or meeting you new people, do they have the knowledge and skills to share with you? On the other hand do they have the ability to give you tips that suit your personality? Can they help you gain the confidence to use them (many general workshops and trainings work on skills but not limiting beliefs)
Do they give you a free consultation to help you find all this out and help you decide if you'd feel comfortable working together
Will they guarantee that if you get nothing useful, they will refund your money?
Check out www.buildingselfconfidence.co.uk as an example
I hope you've found this useful to help you get the most effective help
Have a confident day, Warm wishes from Madeleine Morgan
www.buildingselfconfidence.co.uk
Cambridge
Quick Tip To Help You Build Self Esteem
It doesn't seem to matter how successful people are, everyone experiences crises of confidence or self-esteem at some time in their life and in some area of their lives.
Here's a quick and powerful tip to help you steadily build your self-esteem and confidence so that it's there for you when you need it most. Take a few moments every day to write down the things that went well that day because of what you said, did and thought. Now, I'm thinking about ordinary, everyday successes as well as the major ones.
How can this help? I hear some of you sceptics saying. Well, when we lack self-esteem or confidence it's often because our mind has got into the habbit of ignoring our successes and focussing on our mistakes. Or, it only counts major events. By keeping a success journal you train your mind to spot and appreciate your success and maintain a balanced view of yourself. You also build up lots of evidence to support your self-esteem that you can use to give yourself confidence in difficult times. Having these achievement fresh in your mind can help you when talking about yourself in appraisals, writing your CV, writing your internet dating entry and talking to friends, family, colleagues etc.
We tend to become our habits so give yourself and the people whose lives you touch the gift of the habit of noticing your success. When you give yourself permission to shine, others feel it's okay for them to shine too.
Make your success journal even more colourful with photos of your successful moments. Choose a journal that's a pleasure to touch, such as moleskin.
Have fun! Warm wishes, Madeleine
Madeleine Morgan
A Common Mistake that Causes Lack of Confidence and How to Solve It
A Common Mistake that can Cause Lack of Confidence is Failing to Learn the Skills You Need to Succeed
It’s odd how we instinctively know it’s wise to go to a driving instructor before we drive our first car yet we attempt to do many other important things in life without learning the skills that lead to success.
For instance, we try to:
- present without learning presentation skills training,
- ü negotiate without negotiation skills training,
- ü make a relationship work without understanding how different personalities need to be communicated with and how to repair things when they go wrong,
- invest thousands of £££ in technical skills without learning sales, marketing, networking, people leading and other essential skills that help us make a healthy profit from our products and services,
- get promoted at work without influencing and interview skills,
- try to feel calm, motivated and confident when we haven’t got the foggiest idea how to get rid of our stress, anger and nerves
Somehow we expect these skills to come naturally. Then we blame ourselves for failing instead of blaming ourselves for not learning!
Solution 5 – Invest in Training and Coaching
Research shows that the most successful and confident people in all areas of life invest in understanding how they tick, learning the secrets of the great communicators and how confident people control their emotions when the going gets tough.
They tend to invest between 4% and 10% of their income on personal development.
And, I mean invest – one of my business clients brought in an extra £35,000 a year in profit just because of one influencing principle I taught her. Another client saved hours of time and stress by using this principle with his kids and his team at work.
I have a personal and business development budget invest in courses and coaching that helps me grow and become more resourcefu. I have invested tens of thousands of pounds over the years. Every time I have, I’ve experienced huge returns on my investment financially and in personal and professional fulfilment.
If you'd like to read more useful confidence building tips, sign up for them at www.buildingselfconfidence.co.uk
If you'd like to find out how you can discover more valuable personal, career and business development tools, tips and strategies, go to www.growu.co.uk
Here you'll find information about life, career and business coaching and training in Cambridge UK
Quick Help to Build Self-Confidence for Business Owners and Self-Employed People
Many people who have been made redundant are using their redundancy money to free themselves from the shackles of a job and set up in business. What starts as a dream of creating the dream lifestyle with all the free time, money, freedom from the boss etc. can actually feel tougher than they bargained for. It involves a steep learning curve and 90% of businesses fail in the first 16 months. Which is a shame because when it works it's fantastic. I work with a lot of self-employed people to help them build the business skills and confidence they need and I was moved recently when I opened up an email to find this testimonial in it
"I have been a bit on the quiet side this past couple of weeks and I have to admit have had a 'crisis in confidence'!! Found the goal setting and networking all a bit overwhelming and rather daunting as it is quite new to me and I am at the beginning of my Business set up journery. However, have picked myself up and have to say a huge thanks to Madeleine Morgan and her paper 'How to Avoid 7 of the Mistakes We Make When We Lack Confidence .....' . This couldn't have been more timely and certainly helped me to acknowledge my own self destructive inner talk I had been wallowing in. One of the key points that helped me turn the corner was Mistake one: 'Making Unrealistic Comparisions between Ourselves and Others."
Whatever situation you are in, if you need some quick tips on how to build your self-confidence go to www.buildingselfconfidence.co.uk and sign up for the free report. And carry on creating your dream!
Dealing with Difficult People Made Easier
There is a very challenging saying that there are no difficult people, only inflexible communicators. I don't know if it's true in all circumstances but I like to live as if it is. It stops me feeling the victim of other people I find difficult and empowers me by motivating me to find the secret communication keys that will help me create win-win situations out of win-lose ones. I've found some great tools to help people become more flexible communicators and I'm going to share them in a workshop later this month and in April. The details are below:
Is Dealing with Difficult People Stealing Your Time and Energy and Even Your Wealth?
Then this “Dealing with Difficult People Made Easier” workshop is designed for you
Discover how to stop these people holding back your business, professional or personal life.
Take away tools and strategies that will help you:
- get the best out of your team and your colleagues
- improve client relationships,
- make selling easier
- make your personal life a joy
- and your career or business more rewarding
Among many other things you’ll discover how to:
- § Recognise classic types of difficult people and strategies for handling them
- § Resolve conflict and create win-win outcomes
- § Prepare for challenging situations and avoid escalating them further
- § Develop rapport quickly and easily
- § Deliver difficult feedback confidently and skilfully
- § Read special clues in the body language, voice tones and words people use
- § Learn assertive skills and behaviours – avoid aggressive or passive ones
100% Money Back Guarantee
If by the end of the work you feel your knowledge about how to deal with difficult people has not improved, I will refund your money in full. All I ask is that you return the workshop materials.
Where’s the venue?
St John’s Innovation Centre – Milton Road, Cambridge
What time and date?
9 a.m. – 12.30 p.m. or 1.30 – 5.00pm on Wednesday 24th March
9 a.m. – 12.30 or 1.30 – 5 pm on Wednesday 14th April
So what is your investment to attend?
Because I feel strongly about sharing the tools to create win-win relationships, you can secure your seat for just £147 + VAT
Early bird price of £107 + VAT, if you book before Wednesday 17th March.
You can bring an additional team member from your business (or a guest who is not on my mailing list – perhaps that difficult person J) for £97 + VAT per person.
Places are limited to 4 per session so hurry and book yours!
How do I book?
Call Madeleine Morgan on 01223 426392 or email madeleine@growu.co.uk to confirm your booking or find out more.
“Thanks for making it so useful, informative and lively.” Vicky Faupel, Cambridge Network
“Madeleine is an exceptional coach and trainer.
Over the years, I have received coaching from some of the biggest names in business and personal development. In my estimation she is up there with the big boys.”
Ben Green, Marketing Manager
“I found the workshop very interesting and motivational. I’ve got more tools to create something better than compromise or win-lose situations. I can create win-win outcomes.”
Justine Fairweather, Credit Controller, UK Fixings
Building Self Confidence Through Coaching
Thinking about the Winter Olympics and the opening ceremony again. One of the things that made it so uplifting was that it was designed for the audience to participate - physically (beating drums), visually (with costumes and lights) and sound-wise (with cheers and clapping etc). Sometimes sporting events seem to be just about winning and the audience can feel like a bunch of under-achievers compared to the best of the best. The opening ceremony showed that everyone can make a valuable contribution to the Olympic spirit by giving their enthusiasm and willingness to participate with their own particular gifts. That builds self-confidence.
Remember too that those athletes reached the pinnacle with the help of their coaches. It's their coaches who help them develop the winning mindset, keep the athletes motivated when they want to give up and show them the shortcuts to success. More and more people in all walks of life are experiencing the value that a life, career or business coach bring to help people create more rewarding lives. A coach can help you make life a humane race rather than a rat race.
If you want to find out about the rewards of working with a life coach check out www.buildingselfconfidence.co.uk or www.lifecoach-directory.org.uk
The Winter Olympics and Building Self-Confidence
I was watching the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics on the TV this weekend. The commentators were comparing it to the Olympic Games in China and saying how much better it was to have fewer performers. What I thought was more important to notice was the celebration of the diverse cultures that make Canada such a great country to live in. Where there is acceptance and appreciation it creates an atmosphere which can bring out the best in us all.
How is this relevant to building individual self-confidence? Well, what are things about you that you find hard to accept? Could they be considered strengths by others? What goes around comes around. What could you be more accepting of in others and appreciate as a strength that would create an atmosphere where they would be more willing to see the strengths in you.
Can Positive Thinking Really Build Confidence?
When I first saw this headline mentioned on the BBC in a round up of the newspapers, I was taken aback. My first thought was, if you think that won't work, try negative thinking! In my experience it holds true that, 'If you think you can or you think you can't, you'll probably prove yourself right'. Now, I have to confess that I don't know what the article said, but it did get me thinking.
Now, I agree that if all we do is force positive thoughts on our minds we are likely to encounter inner resistance, especially if we say them in an unconvincing inner tone. This is because our belief system will rebel if it's not aligned with the positive thought. So, for positive thoughts or affirmations to have a chance we need to work with our belief system.
I also agree that positive thoughts need to be backed up by positive action.
I believe what is even more effective is 'Resourceful Thought'. By that I mean that if you come up against a difficulty or obstacle you train yourself to ask 'Resourceful Questions'. These questions could be, 'What do I want instead of this?' and 'How can I get the result I want?. The brain is a question answering machine. Those questions tap into the brain's resources in a positive way and sooner or later it's going to come up with some helpful suggestions. There are loads of other resourceful questions and ways of creating Resourceful Thoughts.
One way to build up your power to strengthen your resourceful thinking is to work with a coach. Because coaches are objective while being supportive they are not caught up in the emotion and funnel vision we experience when we face challenges. So, they are able to take the conversation with you in resourceful directions.
The directory of life coaches and www.lifecoach-directory.org.uk will help you find a coach near you. The Life Coach Directory only allows qualified and insured coaches to have a place on their website.
Also check out my website at www.buildingselfconfidence.co.uk for coaching on self-esteem, relationship, career, confidence and presenting.
Positive thinking can be helpful. Resourceful thinking is even more powerful in helping us to create the happier, healthier and wealthier lives we really want.