Confidence

Confidence: the feeling or belief that one can rely on someone or something; firm trust.

I was talking to a client of mine the other day and he was telling me that he struggles with knowing when a decision is the right one to make, and how he often overthinks the problem so much so that he ends up not making a decision at all. And ultimately how that affects his ability to move a project forward, and in turn, be profitable. 

That he doesn’t have the confidence deep-down that the decision he is making is the right one. Almost like he looks for the adult in the room to tell him what to do.

It can be very easy to fall down the rabbit-hole of over-analyzing a decision. For years in construction, I would constantly wonder if the decision I made was the right one or not. The worst part is that often I wouldn’t know that answer until AFTER I made the decision.

Sound familiar?

Let’s put this into context…

Think of this simple question that gets asked in every Physics 101 class: what falls faster: a pound of rocks or a pound of feathers. Easy, right? The rocks because they’re rocks!

But wait: what if they are both in an elevator shaft and there is no air, therefore no air resistance, making them fall at the same speed? 

But wait, surely that can’t be possible - I mean, how do you even eliminate air-resistance? 

And suddenly, you can’t answer that question.  

Becoming comfortable with decision-making is just as important in running a business as is learning how to estimate, hire trades, and keeping score on your financials (and everything else you do in your business). 

Regardless of how long you’ve done something, we all will doubt that we are making the right decision. Let’s talk about where this comes from. For that… a quick stroll down memory lane.

We spend the first formative chunk of our lives having all our decisions made for us, usually by our parents. Where you went to elementary and high school, what you ate for dinner, what time you went to bed...these are all fundamental decisions that someone else made for you. And there’s a certain sense of security knowing that the buck doesn’t stop with you. That someone else is accountable for that decision, and it’s consequences. 

But at some point, we all grow up, and there’s a fundamental shift where we become the captain of our own ship, and the decisions we make are all our own. Now, granted, we had help getting to that point, but all that guidance and training doesn’t always prepare you for the life-altering realization that you’re grown up now and others are now looking to you to make the call. That you have now become the expert in your field and are calling the shots.

After all, your client has hired you because you are the expert.  

I am?

Yeah, you are. And yes, we all face imposter syndrome which is tied to our confidence in our own ability.  

As I mentioned, I struggled with this early on - but to be honest - it never goes away. Twenty years later, with a successful construction career under my belt, I still have moments where I feel like I’m looking for the adult in the room to make decisions for me.

So how do you know if you’re making the right decision? How do you quiet that little voice inside you that makes you think, and overthink and analyze every possible scenario until you’re not even sure what day it is, let alone which way to support masonry when installing a structural steel beam? 

Here’s the truth. That little voice is supposed to be there to help you make decisions. A bit of self-doubt is good - it keeps you grounded and humbled. The key is managing it so that it doesn’t impede your progress.

My point is, you’re always going to question a decision. It’s a choice to go one way or another, and each of those decisions leads down a different path. 

It might be building decisions that involve how to install that steel beam, which type of insulation to use, or how to line up the flooring in an out of square room. 

Or maybe you’re in a growth stage and wondering how much to invest in additional employees or capital equipment. 

How do you answer them and how do you get comfortable owning the outcomes of those decisions?

While there is truly no substitute for experience, it’s more about incorporating a process for critical decision-making that you can repeat each time you have a decision to make (which is about every 8 seconds in construction).

1. Involve your team. Ask for opinions - and be open to different perspectives. I always found this very helpful when I would see things from different views as it helped me to judge my thoughts against those. I would often find a lot of merit in someone else’s opinion that would help me become more confident with the decision. Whether your team is your client, your employees, your subcontractors, or even your accountant, talk to them. Be open and honest. You’re not being judged for asking a question, in fact, you’ll likely be seen as a more confident business person than you feel you are - because great leaders learn from smart people around them.  
2. Evaluate without emotion. Take a step back and look at the problem from the perspective of “what would I do if time and/or money were not a consideration?” Pro’s and Con’s. What I want you to do is ask yourself “if I do this, will I regret it versus if I don’t do that?”. Example: If I spend the time to protect the newly installed floors will I regret this versus if I don’t. Obviously, that’s a ridiculous statement because we always protect newly installed floors, but the idea is to look at it from the context of ‘I can’t go wrong if I do this, versus if I don’t’.
3. Trust yourself. You’ve gotten this far, and often our lack of confidence comes from not actually trusting ourselves. For every mistake you’ve made, there are piles of others you got ‘right’.  
4. Go with your gut. If you’re anything like me, your gut is a strong evaluator of your decision-making. Mine is rarely wrong - the issue has only been that I don’t listen to it when I know I should. I think that’s where the phrase ‘hindsight is 20/20’ comes from.
5. It’s ok to admit you don’t know. This one is probably the hardest for people who think they must be the ultimate expert. Being humble is just as important as being an expert in the client’s eyes. Next time you’re unsure of how to proceed, try this line: “While I don’t have all the answers, here’s my take on this. I would welcome feedback from our professional partners on this, and will reach out to them and report back by (date)”.

Hopefully this short list of points to use when evaluating every single little detail on your construction projects helps. Just remember, you’ve gotten this far and you know what you’re doing.  

You are the expert because on the scale of authority you are many many miles ahead of the person hiring you to be the expert. And if you don’t have the answers, call it out and then make darn sure you follow through with what you said you were going to do.

Sometimes when we focus on the process of something as opposed to the issue itself, we are amazed at how this can help to change our ability to solve that problem.  

Oh, and for the record - Galileo proved that objects with a heavier mass do?? fall faster unless contained in a vacuum. But life is never lived in a vacuum…