Invest in your confidence

Don’t leave your confidence to chance. Regularly invest time and energy into building bullet proof confidence.

If it’s important to delivering a great performance and getting the results you want, you can’t afford not to do it.

This tool will help you understand what fuels your confidence and know what to do to build confidence.

Reading time: 4 minutes

What will it do?

This tool will help you understand what fuels your confidence and know what to do to build confidence. You’ll get a plan to follow and with regular investment in that plan, watch your confidence grow.

Use this tool right now. Complete steps 1 to 3 to lay the foundations for your confidence-building plan. Then use it regularly to check in with what you’re doing to work on your confidence – you can skip step 1 here, but we’d suggest re-doing this every few months. It’ll take 10 to 15 minutes to complete it properly now. Change won’t happen over night (unless you’re very lucky), but with a bit of effort and commitment, it will happen.

Three steps to take

Get focused on the things that will make the most impact for you

1. Review the list of statements below of things that are typically true when you’re confident.

For each one of these, rate how much this is true for you (0 = this isn’t at all like me, 10 = this is so incredibly like me)

My confidence is high when I… True for you (0-10)
Am very clear on the performance I need to deliver and so are the people around me who matter
Have a plan which I know I can deliver and am focused on delivering it
Am not thinking about the outcome, result or what others think
Think about my strengths and times I’ve done a good job in the past
Feel really prepared and ready – I’ve done everything I can
Visualised/imagined myself performing really well
Connected with people who are really supportive and fuel my confidence
Say positive and supportive things to myself – I’m a model coach to myself!

2. Ok. Now choose the top 3 things that you know make a difference to your confidence.

    They might be things from the list above, or other things, or a combination of both. List those in the table below, and for each, rate how consistently you do this thing (10 = I’m so consistent you could set your watch by me and 0 = it’s hit and miss about whether I do this). Then rate how valuable this would be to your confidence if you invested more time in it more regularly (0= waste of time; 10 = really helpful)
Confidence building activity Consistency Value
e.g. starting my preparation early so I know everything is done 2 8

3. Now for each of the 3 things write down what things you’re going to do on a regular basis to increase your confidence.

So, for example if starting your preparation early is an area to get better and more consistent at, you’d be deciding what exactly you’re going to do and how often – e.g., starting my preparation 3 days before every important meeting I’m chairing; clarifying my picture of success for the meeting and creating a list of what I need to do to be ready. Get detailed and specific with this – write exactly what you’ll be doing and when. Choose a maximum of 5 things only. You can always add to that list once you’ve got great at doing the first lot!

What to do How often/when
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Your plan

Get a plan Stan. The basics you need to have in your plan are set out below.

Plan basics

  1. What are you going to do? This bit is easy – it’s the 3 steps listed above.

    My actions:

  2. When are you going to start? You don’t have to be great to get going, but you better get going if you want to be great.

    My start date:

  3. How often will you be doing it? Getting great has a lot to do with making things a habit.

    Check-in frequency and dates:

Get serious

The difference between having a plan and making it work is about action. So get this in your diary now. Tell the people who need to know so that they can support you and won’t just think you’re being weird. Do it now.

Remember, it’s progress not perfection. You’re looking for gradual improvement, not for Rome to be built in a day.