The Art And Science Of Building Confidence Under Pressure
LinkedIn's career expert and
bestselling author Nicole Williams offers five steps for staying cool when the
stress heats up.
It was the first day of her very
first job and Nicole Williams admits she was “scared sh*tless.”
The
then newly-minted college graduate was way out of her comfort zone. Coming from
a working class family, Williams says she didn’t have the benefit of witnessing
what white-collar professionals did in office situations. “I didn’t have the
pedigree, so I had to be as prepared as I could.”
Studying
and careful grooming aside, Williams was still sweating bullets. “When you are
trying to push the limits you are going to be stressed,” she confesses.
A
lot has changed since that first nerve-wracking first day 20 years ago. In
addition to currently being LinkedIn’s career expert and founder of WORKS, a media company focused
on career development for professional women, Williams has also penned three
bestselling books and cocreated a reality television series.
But
she's quick to admit that she’s worked hard to cultivate a sense of effortless
confidence. On the surface, she says, it’s about stepping into a persona. “It’s
our armor,” she says. And while she advocates being authentic, Williams admits
you should never let colleagues or clients see you sweat. “They perceive you
are less trustworthy, even if they can’t articulate that,” she says.
A
new study on the chemosignals of stress by the Monell Chemical Senses Center in partnership with
P&G's Secret Deodorant, backs this claim. It found that body odors change
with different emotional states, and that affects both the neural and
behavioral states of the receiver --whether or not they’re conscious of it.
"So why not take all that off the table?” Williams asks.
But
it’s hard to fast track calm when you want to make the best impression. Science tells us one strategy is to tell
ourselves we’re excited, rather than anxious, to give off an air of confidence
when the situation heats up.
So
how did Williams go from cold sweat on that first day at the office to the
put-together woman she is now? Here are some the tactics she suggests to help
boost your own confidence.
When
Williams was touring the country promoting her first book, she admits she was a
victim of “got it all together” disease. “No one ever talks about how scared
they are,” she says, especially not someone who is a career expert. Initially,
she mitigated stress by containing it, so no one would suspect she lacked
confidence.
Life
had a hand in changing her attitude. “I worked my ass off,” she says, “I was
divorced, broke, and then I had a kid at 43.” Now says Williams, “I’m more
realistic about what’s happening.”
Like
the time during a snowstorm when she had to get her son to preschool and
herself to a meeting. Williams knew she was going to be late. Five years ago,
her “control freak” self wouldn’t have admitted nature was getting in the way
of her professional life. But she’s discovered that people are much more
receptive when she’s honest, and it gives her a chance to exhale, too.
“Confidence
is earned,” says Williams, “You build it through experience.” Like management
which she also views as a muscle, gaining confidence takes practice. Her best
advice? “Practice in situations that are not dire.”
By
pre-stressing yourself, you’ll discover what your threshold is for keeping it
together under pressure. To test your mettle, Williams recommends videotaping
yourself giving a mock presentation. The play back will make it obvious if you
overuse a word or doing something distracting.
For
Williams, it’s her hands. An appearance on the Today Show drove home the
fact that she’s an “outrageous hand talker” gesturing with every sentence.
“Unless you see yourself doing it, it doesn’t really set in,” she explains.
Once you are aware of your tics, you can work on minimizing them. Then, if
you’re ever caught by surprise, you’ll appear that much more poised.
This
approach helped Williams mid-career when a big presentation went horribly
wrong, despite her careful preparations. Recognizing she did her best and
maintained a sense of dignity throughout helped deflect the negative demons
within.
Williams
believes that any career can be rife with learning opportunities, even if you
don’t have a dedicated mentor to guide your every step. For Williams, it began
with a woman in her first job who pointed out that her hem was too high and she
wasn’t getting the attention she deserved.
Now
she says, she takes mentoring moments to build her arsenal of confidence. “I
don’t believe in reinventing the wheel. I’m quick to ask the question instead
of presuming I have the answer.”
Stress
builds when we are waiting for something to happen. “Our anticipation is so
much worse than doing the thing you’re afraid of,” she observes. Instead of
procrastinating so much that you lose sleep, take apart the situation, think it
over logically and get it over with as soon as possible. “You are going to
survive this,” Williams says. Stress can be a great thing, she says, because it
signals that you are doing something challenging.
Though
she’s incorporated these lessons from her past, Williams says it wasn’t too
long ago that she believed all the pieces of her life would magically fit
together at some point down the road and lead to permanent bliss.
She’s
not waiting for that any more. With a pocketful of authentic confidence,
Williams says she’d advise her older self to appreciate what’s working and
focus on that. “It gives you more motivation to take risks,” she points out.
By Lydia Dishman http://www.fastcompany.com/3025083/how-to-be-a-success-at-everything/the-art-and-science-of-building-confidence-under-pressure?partner=newsletter
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