Confidence and Leadership: 5 Keys I Wish I Knew Earlier

Welp… once again we find ourselves in uncertain times. What’s new?

To be honest - it doesn’t matter where the market is or if the quarter is going great — you are always going to be navigating uncertainty.

Wherever you find yourself in your leadership style or stage:

• you’re just starting out in a leadership position
• you’re a veteran leader of a company
• you’re simply looking to better confidently lead your own life

Great leadership leans into uncertainty with confidence.

To me, confidence doesn’t mean “I know how things will go.” It means, "I know I can respond to however things will go."

Here’s 5 things I wish I knew earlier and what’s elevated my ability to navigate uncertain times:

1. Focus on What Won’t Change

Okay.

I know I said earlier that the only certain constant is change.

But hear me out, I have a point.

There is always something in your industry that won’t change.

And it all comes down to what people value.

A lot of companies and people focus on the next big thing. While that has its value…always following what’s hot and new is a fool’s path.

You pay attention to things that are constantly changing instead of things that last.

The core of your value as a leader, a person, a company should be centered around things that are timeless.

For example: Japanese automakers focus on core principles that don’t change:

1. Reliability
2. Affordability
3. Practicality

Tech companies that thrive, focus on products that have:

1. Speed
2. Simplicity
3. Ease of Use

People aren’t going to wake up in ten years and say “Man, I wish this application was slower.”

Understanding timeless desires, means you can cultivate timeless value.

Leading with this philosophy cultivates confidence in how you choose to respond in any situation.

How you accomplish meeting those desires may change, (using different technology, testing different processes, experimenting with new ideas, etc).

But focusing on timeless, unchanging values will always keep you on a clear path.

That type of focus is a confidence builder.

2. Use Doubt as a Tool

?Hot-Take: You don’t need to be an ultra cool, know-it-all to be an effective leader.

Doubt is here to serve you.?

In fact the vulnerability behind doubt can be an asset to effective leadership.

Doubt is part of human nature, like fear, it’s weaved into our biological make-up to protect us from danger.

But there’s two sides to this.

1. Too much doubt can be destructive that you end up not doing anything at all or jump to foolish decisions.
2. While just enough doubt can be a tool to push you into a state of excellence and steer you clear from the Dunning-Kruger Effect that we find a lot of our politicians in.

(Too much of a hot-take? Anyways…)

“Doubt can be applied intelligently, like a sharp instrument: it's only as constructive as the person wielding it.”

Doubt can be applied so intelligently, that you can use it to BUILD your confidence.

How can you use doubt to build confidence?

If you find yourself in a state of imposter syndrome or doubt:

1. Re-frame your mentality as discernment instead of doubt.
2. Discern between: Am I doubting myself or doubting my work?

Asking yourself this can divorce you from the destructive side of doubt (judging yourself) and move you into the constructive side of doubt (objectively judging your work).

?Instead of judging yourself as a person, you'll find you can stay on the path of confidence if you continue to practice deconstructing:

• your work
• your efforts
• quality of your process

All of those can be thoughtfully updated or improved.

Confidence is dependent on a solid internal process of responding and understanding that growth isn’t linear or perfect.

Doubting your work can be practical, productive, and valuable.

Doubting yourself can be detrimental.

Practice the former.

Alright, I’ve written “doubt” so many times, it’s starting to look weird.

Let’s move on…

3. Cultivate Patience - Adversity is the Path

Embodying patience can be a means of cultivating confidence.

There are no shortcuts.

The home built hastily rarely survives the first storm.

Building out your career, building out your next successful project, building out a thriving business - there will always be storms.

When adversity shows up - I’ve found the most fruitful circumstances have come from approaching a situations with a balance of urgency in action but mental patience.

What does that mean?

Gary V calls it “Micro-Hustle, Macro-Patience”

Sometimes people interpret patience as resignation.

Patience doesn’t mean don’t act.

Cultivating patience means you understand there’s a process.

Growth isn’t linear.

There are always cycles and seasons.

When you lack patience, you can often take shortcuts without knowing it, leading to detrimental results. Those results can kill your confidence.

Cultivate your understanding of cycles in your industry, the process of growth, and you'll be better able to lead with a confident, level head.

4. Build Evidence

Lots of talk on confidence on social media.

But confidence doesn't come out of thin air.

Don’t just build confidence, build evidence.

It’s as simple as doing what you said you’d do.

To me, confidence doesn’t mean “I know how things will go.” It means, I know I can respond to however things will go.

You build more trust and confidence in your ability to respond to anything that comes your way when you have a track record of doing so.

By default - confidence is a natural consequence of following through on your word.

Big talk is easy. Big “doing” is hard. So start small and build your track record.

5. Practice Radical Curiosity + Abundance Mentality

It’s a lot easier to be confident when you come from a state of radical curiosity. Mainly because it puts you into a more functional state.

Instead of being frustrated with things not going my way, I’ll be fascinated. I train my mind to go to possibilities.

?Try it.

Something as simple as:

• “I can’t believe that guy just cut me off” to “Wow, I wonder what that guy has going on today?”
• “This person is never going to get the job done.” to “How else can I better understand what they need for them to thrive?”

The shift in perspective can be applied to anything.

That shift in asking a question versus making a judgment changes your state to be more functional, proactive, solution oriented, and compassionate — aren’t those all qualities of confident leaders?

Moving from an assumption or judgment to “maybe there’s more to find out from this” creates more possibilities than your small scarcity mind can fathom.

Practicing radical curiosity and abundance mentality frees you from accepted limitations.

Simple.

Ask questions.

Believe there’s more to the situation.

Build yourself into a confident leader.

Just saying.

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