The coach's corner - June 2023

Julia Rowan answers your management, leadership and team development questions

I am terrified of making a mistake or being seen as stupid. So, I work very long hours, perfecting my tasks, rarely speaking at meetings and avoid taking any kind of risk. How can I feel confident about what I am doing?

When clients tell me about a fear they have, such as making a mistake, I ask them when was the last time they made a mistake. Most clients can’t come up with any evidence at all to support their fear.  

In fact, they mostly have evidence to contradict their fear, such as praise from organisational leadership.  

Isn’t it interesting that our thoughts trump our lived experiences?  

To overcome your fears, write down the evidence you have proving it’s legitimate as well as evidence that contradicts your fear.  

What does looking at those lists change? 

Here’s a mnemonic I love: FEAR – False Evidence Appearing Real.  The ‘false evidence’ is your thoughts and the ‘appearing real’ is the impact of those thoughts on your emotions, physical experience and behaviour.  

It is often worth bringing issues of self-esteem and confidence to a therapist. It could be worthwhile to enquire about access to your organisation’s Employee Assistance Programme.  

I contribute a lot at meetings but don’t make an impact.  I love my job; I am always well prepared and I’m a confident speaker – but I don’t seem to get my point across.

Whether making a formal presentation or speaking at a meeting, I often advise clients that every word should work for its place.  

When we know a lot about a subject, there can be a tendency to want to over-share that information – more than the audience needs – especially at a presentation. 

In addition, extraverted types (who make sense of things by talking about them) often use 10 words where one would do, then they add another example, which reminds them of something that happened… You get the picture.  

Whenever you have an important presentation, rehearse what you want to say out loud. It takes real discipline to pare your points back to the core and trust that you have said enough.  

It’s important to hold onto this learned discipline at the Q&A by giving short answers. People can always ask for more information if they want it (whereas it is hard to say “that’s enough, thank you”).

At meetings, I suggest that people preface what they want to say with a line such as, “I have three (two or one) main points” and then number the points as you make them.  This puts structure on what you want to say and helps you to be brief.  

Make sure to reflect on your audience – how interested in the subject are they? How much do they already know? What is the objective of your presentation?  What part of your contribution are they more or less interested in? Tailor your answer to their needs. 

Julia Rowan is Principal Consultant at Performance Matters Ltd, a leadership and team development consultancy. To send a question to Julia, email julia@performancematters.ie.