ON BEING A MORE CONFIDENT LEADER

PABLITO P. GANTAN, JR.

Nowadays, schools are surrounded with young and promising leaders who have reached the position because of their educational qualifications, relevant trainings and workshops and willingness to go the extra mile to perform their assigned tasks even beyond office hours or weekends if needed.

According to Dan McCarthy, a popular leadership guru and book author and regular contributor of the business blog SmartBrief, what these leaders have is “confidence,” which they use to possess in exchange to experience which they have, or must have.

After doing a little research, McCarthy came up with the following ways to develop leadership confidence. McCarthy hopes anyone wanting to develop leadership self-confidence can use the list to create their own development plan.

1. Learn about leadership. Take a course, read a few books, subscribe to this publication, and study the great leaders. Learn what leaders do and don’t do. Learn the frameworks, the tools, and the skills required to lead. The more you know about subject, including leadership, the more confident you’ll be.

2. Network with other leaders. While it’s good to learn about leadership from courses and reading, putting those good ideas to practice is hard and mistakes will be made. Having a network, or support group of peers is a healthy way to share common, real world challenges. It will give you a feeling of “I’m not the only one who feels this way.”

3. Develop realistic self-awareness. Knowing your leadership strengths will give you confidence, and facing up to your development needs will help you determine what you need to focus on to get better. Feedback will give a leader realistic self-awareness. Leaders that ask for feedback are seen as more confident than those that don’t.

4. Help others be more successful. Leadership confidence isn’t just about building your own track record of wins. The essence of leadership is helping others around you become more successful. Help other gain self-awareness, coach them, and help put them in the best position to be successful.

5. Celebrate wins. When your team or colleagues hit a milestone or does something awesome, let them and everyone else know! This isn’t about tooting your own horn - it’s about getting into the habit of looking for and recognizing the wins of others.

6. Look confident. Pay attention to your physical appearance. Losing weight, getting in shape, a new pair of glasses, new hairstyle, a new suit, or a new pair of shoes can make you feel and look more confident. Watch your posture, make eye contact, smile, and use a firm grip when shaking hands.

7. Learn and practice positive psychology. Optimism and happiness can be learned.

8. Develop your emotional intelligence (EQ). Self-confidence is the mark of an emotionally intelligent leader. EQ isn’t something you are born with, it can be learned and developed.

9. Project confidence. While you may be terrified inside, learn to “fake it till you make it” by appearing that you are confident. Terrified of public speaking? Take a presentation skills course.

10. Ask others for help. Confident leaders know what they know and what they don’t know, and are not afraid to ask for help. They draw on the talents of others without feeling threatened.

McCarthy concluded that working on these ways at the same time would be overwhelming and impossible, so try picking one or two at a time. He advised young leaders to look for incremental improvement and celebrate their success, and before they know it, they’ll feel and act like a more confident leader.

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The author is Teacher III at San Juan High School