Winner, Loser, or Also-ran? How Attitude Defines You

Attitudes reveal us—what we value, how we think, and what we’re after. They’re the stuff of statements like:

• “With an attitude like that he’ll be an obstacle on our project?”
• “We don’t need a supervisor with an attitude like hers?”
• “I can’t give him a good rating with that attitude.”

People observe our attitudes and then define us through their own attitude-shaded lens. Like it or not, we’re locked in an inexorable cycle of labeling.

Attitudes revealed

Attitude is defined as either a positive or hostile disposition or state of mind. Our feelings, thoughts, and points of view form our attitudes.

No matter how we come by them, attitudes become features like traits and characteristics that can work for or against career success.

We live in a fast-and-loose labeling world. There are labels for everyone in every profession and walk of life.

Politicians will label you as a conservative, liberal, moderate, progressive, or independent even if your viewpoints don’t fit their label for every issue.

At work, you’re put into attitude boxes like team player, go-getter, troublemaker, or bullier even when your attitudes are situation based.

Attitude labels stick, so we need to understand how we’re attracting them and how to turn them around when they’re a liability.

Look at yourself

Your attitude is the one thing in life that you always control. So if you’re displaying attitudes that are causing you problems you don’t want, change!

Start with some self-appraisal:

• Make a list of the positive and negative words being used by others to define your attitude.  (Reread your last two performance appraisals for insights. Listen closely to what your boss and peers are saying to or about you.)
• Next to each word, write 3 situations where you remember doing or saying something that triggered it. (If you can’t remember, ask a trusted coworker or your boss for help.)
• Talk to a family member or friend about how you come across in certain circumstances. Chances are your attitudes show up in you personal life too.

Commit to an attitude management plan:

• Identify actions you will take to retain positive attitude labels and fix the negative ones.
• Identify triggers that bring out your negative attitudes and how you will manage your actions and words when they appear.
• Schedule a meeting with your boss to discuss your commitment to improving attitudes that need work.
• Share your plan for change and solicit your boss’s support. Be as specific as practical.
• Make good on your plan by sticking with it.
  

The harsh reality is that attitude is more important to career success than talent. No one wants to work with a gifted leader or technician with a bad attitude. Good results are more likely to come from those with average talent who are happy working together.

The consequences of inaction

Negative attitude labels that go uncorrected can crush a career. Winners showcase can-do attitudes, collaboration, courage, and trustworthiness, even in the heat of battle.

The also-rans (ah, yes, another label) are those who go unnoticed. Their attitudes are often unrevealed, other than their willingness to just go along with what’s asked. They don’t make waves and they don’t progress much either.

Employees with negative attitudes often resist direction, find fault with all decisions, bully co-workers, and/or obstruct progress. They perceive they’re winning when their careers are actually in free-fall.

When our attitudes are on display, observers reinforce the labels they’ve assigned to us, until one day their labels have replaced our names. We become known as the:

• Obstructionist or Problem Child
• Hard-ass or Power Monger
• Team Player or Advocate

Negative labels can be dangerous. Just watch a political campaign and see how labels about what a candidate believes are turned into weaponry through name-calling and pigeonholing.

You need to protect yourself from unfair attitude labeling by renewing efforts to manage your attitudes effectively. If where you work doesn’t fit your nature, do the smart thing: Employ attitudes that serve you positively each day while you take steps to make a career change. You can do this!

Photo from Ayleen Gaspar via Flickr

Career in a Rut? Partner Up and Push. | A “Business Fitness” BOGO

Careers are personal. They’re about what we want from our work life and what we’ll risk to get it.                

Navigating our career path can be lonely. What it takes to be successful isn’t always clear. The messages we get may be vague or conflicting. Our coworkers may have agendas that don’t include us. 

Going it alone is how many manage their careers. That makes about as much sense as trying to lose weight, quit smoking, or master tennis without a support system. We all need someone in our corner to keep us going; they need us too. 

A rescue offer 

I wrote Business Fitness: The Power to Succeed—Your Way to make managing your career easier and to get beyond the fluff. 

If you’re ready to get serious about your career planning, I’d like to make it easy for you get (re)started: 

For all of January 2012, I’m offering buy one get one (BOGO) free, signed copies of my book.  

Just go to my website “book” tab and add one (1) copy to your cart for $19.95. (I’ll know to send two by your date of purchase.) Shipping is free in the continental U.S. 

A great career development strategy is a powerful thing. Here’s how you can us the book to build yours.

The power of partnering 

When building your career, there’s real value in partnering with someone you trust and respect, someone to hold you accountable for setting goals and staying the course for success. 

There reasons galore why we benefit from the support of a partner: 

• It’s difficult for us to see ourselves objectively. We need a filter. 
• It’s difficult to stay motivated when things go awry, when we’ve been disappointed, and when we lose our optimism. 
• It’s difficult to stay up when our self-confidence wanes, self-doubt haunts us, and opportunities have been missed. 

Whether careers are exotic or mundane, they often progress in mysterious and unpredictable ways. The only aspects we control are the choices we make, the capabilities we develop, the chances we take, and the relationships we form. 

Along the way, we need to  build momentum around our efforts until the pieces take shape and a picture of our career emerges. A “business fitness” partner can keep us on track.

 Keep pushing 

Finding career success isn’t easy. It means always pressing forward. Funny, how we continually need to push and be pushed. So give this approach a try: 

• Select a single partner or small group (no more than 5)
• Agree to meet at a set day and time (at least twice monthly)
• Use your first meeting to establish ground rules, particularly confidentiality around information shared. Then share what kind of success each of you wants right now.
• Assign one chapter from Business Fitness to be read and discussed at each meeting. Agree to share answers to the inventories at each chapter end.
• After all the chapters have been discussed, go back and (re)write your career goals and share. Hold each other accountable for specific statements.
• Use each subsequent meeting to review progress on goals, provide insights and support, and identify ways to help each other move forward. 
• Make the meetings and the process fun!

This process is part book club, mastermind group, and individual mentoring/coaching. As you progress, you’ll come up with endless next steps that will build your capabilities, strengthen your self-confidence, and deepen relationships. 

Career building takes discipline. There are no shortcuts that are sustainable. When we’re at our best, we feel business fit. To get there, we need each other.

How Careers Build from a “Small Bang” | Vital Pivotal Moments

Business is focused on ends—results, outcomes, the bottom line, and competitive advantage. We are too. 

For us, salary, raises, perks, and promotions are standard measures of how our careers are going. 

Ends always follow beginnings somewhere back in time. Today’s results can be the product of multiple starting-point events that affected us and others. 

The “small bang”   

Pivotal moments create the small bang. Without our knowing it, we will come face-to-face with choices that represent turning points. The right choices mean smooth sailing. The wrong ones make for a rough ride or dead ends. 

Pivotal moments are often sudden and somewhat mysterious. They may come from: 

• Something you hear that sticks with you
• Someone you meet who opens a path
• An act you complete with surprising results, approval, or insight
• An event that unfolds around you, giving you a sense of cause 

Each moment feels like a small bang in your awareness, a sudden awakening that gets your attention. They are starting points that ultimately lead you to the ends, hopefully, that you want. 

Periscopes up! 

Pivotal moments are missed unless you’re watching for them. The more distracted you are by the noise and activity around you, the more likely you are to let those small bangs to fade into the ether. 

Pivotal moments pop up in all situations: 

Libya: The first rebel action (pivotal moment) in Libya ultimately led to liberation (result) from 42 years of tyranny under Col. Qaddafi. His recent death (pivotal moment) committed the Libyans to now “work hard on democracy so their kids can take it for granted?” (result).  (This quote is from CBS Sunday Morning, October 23, 2011.) 

Tim Tebow: A standout college quarterback, the much-hyped Tebow, now a rookie, pro quarterback for the Denver Broncos, is considered by many as having questionable capabilities. On October 23, after a come-from-behind fourth quarter and then overtime (pivotal moments), Tebow got a win (result.) If his career takes off, this game will likely be considered a major turning point.

Business Owner’s Widow: After years of back-office work in her husband’s water drilling business, Patricia became a widow and heir to the company. Instead of selling, as most expected, she took the reins (pivotal moment), dealt tough personnel issues, weathered the recession, made hard business decisions, and kept the business profitable (result).

Struggling Manager: Paul took over a dysfunctional department. Lacking the necessary management skills, he found himself in a quagmire. His boss threatened to fire him if things didn’t turn around. He decided to get some coaching help (pivotal moment) from me that enabled him to resolve the issue, putting him back in management’s good graces (result). 

I’ve had my share of pivotal moments too, many of which have led to unexpected career opportunities: 

A phone call: After weeks of vet visits for my ailing dog, I got a call from my veterinarian frantically asking me if I could help him with a staff problem since he knew I was a corporate manager. I said I would (pivotal moment) and it led to the start of my consulting practice (result).

A chance outing:  While at an expo for horse enthusiast’s, a friend and I met a vendor selling equine art. We asked each other about doing the same and the answer was “yes” (pivotal moment). It led to a business venture that lasted for a decade (result).

A presentation: As a fledging project leader, I was required to deliver a ground-breaking proposal to executive management (pivotal moment). The success of the presentation and the project boosted my professional credibility, becoming the foundation for my career growth (result). 

Take stock. 

Your pivotal moments are the stepping-stones on your Yellow Brick Road. They are the markers, the clues, and the turning-point moments that propel you forward or, unfortunately, sometimes backward. 

We all need to pay attention to the “small bangs” that come our way that signal opportunity, change, and/or insights. It’s often the little things that create the momentum that propels our careers. Keep your antennae up, okay? 

Photo from Katri Niemi via Flickr

The Employee Development Bait and Switch—Perpetrator or Victim?

It is a downer when we discover that there are few growth opportunities offered at our jobs. 

When we’re hired, there’s usually someone who talks about how the company is committed to developing employees. For sure there will be a fine orientation program and skills training. Then there may be tuition refund offerings, a chance to go to conferences, those wonderful stretch assignments, and mentoring. 

So we eagerly dig into our jobs to discover that: 

• Work demands leave no time for development
• Orientation and training are sporadic and informal at best
• There are major restrictions on tuition refund
• No one really mentors or even supervises, for that matter 

In other words, when it comes to our development, we’re often on our own. 

Who’s to blame? 

There’s plenty of blame to go around, and the blame game rarely fixes anything. The problem is: 

• Many supervisors don’t have the will, ability, and/or time to develop anyone because day-to-day demands don’t enable it
• Human resource personnel/departments are stretched and employee development initiatives are a low company priority
• The company’s business strategy doesn’t recognize the bottom-line value of increasing employee capabilities
• Employees aren’t taking the initiative to develop their capabilities on their own 

In a business setting, growth is about expanding our knowledge, skills, and experiences so we can: 

• Perform in broader arenas and take on more responsibility
• Contribute new and better ideas to increase product/service value
• Be ready to rise in the organization 

Employee development is an advantage to the company and to us personally. 

What to do? 

The economy today is a major challenge to most businesses. The chances of our bosses, HR, or the company looking out for our development are slim, in spite of what’s said. 

So we can sit around and complain or we can take our development into our own hands. 

Your development starts with an awareness of what you want from your career: So, 

• Write one-sentence describing your career aspirations. (If you can’t write it in one sentence, you’re not truly clear about what you want.)
• Then write a list of the skills, knowledge or experiences that you want to add or expand.
• Identify no or low cost actions that you can initiate and manage. List other development activities that you will propose to your boss.
• Put together your own development plan for the next year, stating which activities you will complete each quarter and their value to the company. 

Coming up with initiatives is the challenging part, so here are some suggestions: 

In-house book club: Offer to organize and lead a book club of coworkers around specific books on topics like leadership, project management, and communication that will meet at specific times on or off the clock.

Free on-line webinars: Identify well-known experts on the behaviors you need for career success, attend their free on-line webinars, or ask your boss if the company will cover the cost.

Twitter chats: Find opportunities on Twitter to participate in topical chats at places like #careerchat, #hrchat, or #leadershipchat. Capture key ideas and input; summarize them and share/discuss them with your boss.

Mentors: Seek out mentors within and outside your company. Be clear about the kind of advice and feedback you’re seeking. Maintain a positive relationship.

Blogs: Follow expert bloggers in the growth areas important to you. Comment, ask questions, and build connections with them.

Courses and conferences: Identify coursework or conferences that are relevant to your work and your growth. Ask to attend and offer to share your knowledge when you return through a staff meeting report, white paper, training session, or presentation. 

Add value. 

Your development has the greatest value when it serves both the company and your career. The more you do to expand what you learn to bring better results, teach others, and add to the capabilities of the company, the more support you’ll get for your initiatives. Please don’t wait to be developed. It’s your career, so own it. 

Photo from opensourceway via Flickr

Think You’re Not Good Enough? Look Around. | Evolving Self-Confidence

I’ve never reposted before, but after reading Cherry Woodburn’s initial post in her “Confidence Chronicles” series, I knew it was time to repost this one.  Cherry’s interview with Jacqui Barrett-Poindexter, career services entrepreneur and one of only 27 Master Resume Writers in the world, showcases the core importance of confidence to career success. 

I often hear this: “I don’t have enough:

• experience for that job
• knowledge to lead a team
• years with the company to advance
• know-how to start my own business.” 

Exactly, who says we aren’t good enough? Most of the time, we’re the guilty party.

Doubt is our enemy.

Negative self-talk is often riddled with self-doubt. We look at what others are achieving, compare ourselves, and question whether we have what it takes. We self-assess against standards that we invent before we know what the real expectations are.

Self-confidence is as much about being willing to explore an opportunity as it is about being able to execute an assignment. All too often, we worry about our ability to do a job before we understand what it is.

Doubt cannot be allowed to rule.  

The antidote to doubt is reality. Not some “reality” you imagine but the reality that exists.

Start by looking around. Who is doing the work that you think you’re “not good enough” to do as well or better?

Look hard and long at those people. Watch exactly what they do and say. Pay attention to the actual results they produce. Examine their work closely. Find out what others are saying about it.

Then ask yourself, “Can I produce work like that or better?”  My guess is that, in most cases, your answer will be, “Sure.”

If you’ve been reading my posts for a bit, you know that I spent many years as a commercial horse breeder. I knew nothing about it when I started.

Before I bought my farm, I had doubts about whether or not I could care for horses on my own since I’d had no knowledge or experience. The owner of the barn where I’d been boarding warned me, “You could kill those horses if you don’t feel ‘em right.” That rocked me.

Then I stopped to think about her and the other people I’d met who were in the horse business. I asked myself, “Is there any reason to believe that the people in this business are smarter than I am? Do I have good people to advise me when I have questions?” The answers were obvious.

Self-confidence is not arrogance. 

Arrogance is when you act like you know everything. Self-confidence is about believing in yourself. It builds courage, keeps you moving forward in spite of setbacks, and enables you to seize opportunities to grow.

You find self-confidence by looking positively at yourself, acknowledging what you can do. You build self-confidence by testing your capabilities.

The biggest mistake we make is telling ourselves that we have to be the best at something before we are “entitled” to be self-confident. In fact, we just have to be as good as the situation requires.

Role models are everywhere. 

If your self-confidence is a bit shaky, it’s time to look around and see who’s out there doing what you want to do with capabilities similar to yours. In the past four months, I watched these two confidence-building situations unfold:

1.) A Gen Y college grad, who hated her job, started a blog, made professional on-line contacts, was recognized for her writing talents, started freelancing, and just got a full-time job.

2.) An experienced marketing professional was downsized, couldn’t find another job, talked to independent contractors about how they worked, informally looked for clients, blogged about her “start up” experiences, got great advice, opened an office, and saw her business start to grow.

Self-confidence evolves. Every step you take helps you build your truly capable self. You can mentor, volunteer to lead a team, give speeches, deliver training, start a hobby business, or cover a temporary vacancy at work.

Every step you take to become business fit builds your self-confidence. If you haven’t had a chance to learn the seven smart moves, perhaps now’s the time. Your self-confidence is your success engine. Without it, we don’t move very far or very fast. Vroooom!

How has your self-confidence been tested? What were you able to do to overcome your doubts and move ahead?  

Photo from nicer than air via Flickr

The Curse of Unshakable Labels—Overcoming Career Blots

“If you don’t make mistakes, you aren’t doing anything” is a leadership tenet that promotes innovation, risk-taking, continuous improvement, and decision-making. 

It’s a way to motivate employees, overcome fear of failure, and promote creativity. 

However, there’s an unstated caveat even in the most enlightened companies: “Some mistakes are unacceptable, even intolerable.” 

There’s a line we can’t cross and if we do, the mark on us is indelible. 

The dreaded line 

We make mistakes for lots of reasons: 

• Lack of knowledge (Inputting the wrong code)
• Inattentiveness or carelessness (Forgetting to notify the board)
• Misdirected loyalties and confidence (Revealing confidential information)
• Confusion and chance (Misspeaking to the media) 

Saying or doing the wrong thing has its consequences. Some are insignificant, some problematic, and some unshakable. 

It’s only after our gaff that we know its effect on our career brand.  The way we find out is often by how people refer to us as a matter of description or introduction: 

“You know who ____ is. S/he’s the one who: 

• Lied about….
• Couldn’t do the job
• Went ballistic/threw a punch
• Dressed like a bum/floozy
• Lost that big account
• Couldn’t handle the pressure” 

Once our mistakes become legend, they are hard to bury.

The case of Amanda Knox 

The impact of negative branding will be the forever challenge for Amanda Knox, first charged, sentenced, and then exonerated for the horrific murder of her roommate in Perugia, Italy. 

Amanda spent four years in an Italian prison for a crime, it was ultimately proven, she and her boyfriend did not commit. Her saga is a frightful one and some will never believe she didn’t commit this awful crime. (A third party has been convicted in the killing and is in jail.) 

From the outset, Amanda was the target of negative labels, particularly in the Italian press. She was called: 

• “the monster of Perugia”
• “foxy knoxy” (a former childhood nickname that resurfaced in the press)
• “she-devil” 

Henry Chu, from the Tribune Newspapers, wrote: 

“For the past four years, Amanda Knox…has been the focus of breathless debate of whether she was a calculating, remorseless vixen…or the helpless victim of a character assassination and a botched police investigation in a foreign land.” 

This dichotomy of perception will likely follow Amanda for her lifetime. She’ll give her name and people will ask, “Are you that Amanda Knox?” And she will need to reply. 

Overcoming “those” labels 

Sometimes we deserve the negative labels we get and sometimes we don’t. They become part of our brand either way. 

You can point to lots of prominent people who have had career blots to overcome like former President Bill Clinton for his dalliances; Elton John for his drug and alcohol excesses, and Martha Stewart for insider trading. 

Our individual brands have their own unique reach. For some it’s global or national. For others it’s state or local. For us it may be within our company or circle.

Counteracting those labels isn’t easy but doable with effort. We fix negatives with positives, Big Positives. 

The good things we do need to overshadow the mistake(s) we’ve made. They need to be bigger and more memorable. They need to take the place of the negative story. 

Bill Clinton heads his global initiative, doing high impact work worldwide. Elton John raises boatloads of money to combat AIDS. Martha Stewart drives her business straight through those old negatives. 

Amanda Knox will have to do something too, something more than a book or a movie. She’s only 24 years old and faced with global notoriety she surely isn’t ready for. What she does next to overcome the blot on her reputation will be a challenging case in brand management. 

Guard your brand 

Your brand is your reputation and you’re its keeper. It’s tempting to think it takes care of itself, but that would be reckless. 

Our brands can be negatively affected without our knowing it, particularly through social media. So now’s the time to take special care of something that will take care of you and your career for a long time. 

Photo by deeleea via Flickr

3 Problems Solved with a Little Respect | Managing Relationships

Pro athletes are famous for grumbling to the media about players or teams saying, “They don’t respect us.” The words become a kind of call to arms. Sports commentators run the clips repeatedly to stoke what promises to be pending conflict. Then we tune in. 

Disrespect happens to us too. We all bring our dignity to work and expect to be treated respectfully. When we aren’t, we get our backs up. 

Self-esteem sensitivity 

Feeling disrespected is about hurt self-esteem, affronts to self-worth, and lack of deference. It’s personal and can be deep. 

If your response is, “Oh, come on, now,” think of situations where you’ve been offended, intentionally or not, by someone at work. 

Your reaction will likely be more intense if the person who disrespected you: 

• Had done it repeatedly
• Was someone you trusted/confided in
• Was your boss or higher
• Should have known better
• Was trying to undercut you

Our challenge is to defuse disrespect toward us while also avoiding disrespectful behaviors of our own. 

Respect disarms perceptions of disrespect 

Sometimes we find ourselves branded as disrespectful and need to use a little respect to solve the problem. Here are a few to consider: 

1. Your boss is insulted by your apparent disinterest in his/her project. 

Start showing respect by arriving early for project meetings, paying serious attention during discussions (which means staying off your mobile device and/or laptop), asking pertinent questions, and responding to requests. 

2. Your coworkers are frustrated because you routinely interrupt them. 

Not letting others speak may seem like you’re demeaning their ideas and considering yourself superior. Launch dialogue with your coworkers by asking questions. Validate what’s said and then add your ideas to the mix. Continue to engage everyone until a consensus is reached. 

3. Coworkers think you don’t like them. 

If you use a dismissive tone of voice, fail to acknowledge others, ignore their overtures, speak impolitely, or criticize openly, your coworkers will feel disrespected. Offering a greeting, engaging in casual conversation, being courteous, and recognizing achievement are ways to show your respect that build positive relationships. 

No respect…No progress 

Lack of respect is no trivial matter. Showing it establishes us as being both professional and desirable as a colleague. 

Signs of respect are in simple things like coming to work dressed appropriately, using polite speech, and showing regard for the leadership whether you agree with all their decisions or not. 

I remember being horrified when, at the senior VP’s staff meeting, one of his vice presidents assaulted him with searing language (including a string of ef-bombs) about a decision he’d made. The senior VP just sat there and took it, not succumbing to the provocation, but red-faced nonetheless. 

Even though the majority of the staff was also against the senior VP’s decision, that display of disrespect was so appalling that it shut down all discussion. 

That’s the consequence of disrespect. It becomes a barrier to progress. When we feel disrespected by someone, we can’t hear what they have to say. So we set up emotional roadblocks that are impenetrable. 

Win with respect 

Feeling respected as a human being, an employee, and a coworker can have a powerful positive effect on any relationship. Showing respect even when at odds keeps the door open and the opportunities for collaboration alive.

Respect doesn’t cost us anything. Actually, showing respect for others demonstrates the respect we have for ourselves. 

Acting respectfully is a behavior we control. It’s an asset to our personal brand and to our careers. It’s another winning career behavior. Try it. You’ll like it.

Photo from Dyanna via Flickr

Afraid to Innovate or Don’t Know How? | Problem-solving Skills Pay

“Innovativeness” is one of those performance appraisal categories that often befuddle supervisors and employees. 

We often don’t know how the term actually applies to us. After all, we’re just doing our jobs. Innovation seems to have more to do with creative work (maybe in marketing) or in science (like in a lab somewhere). Too often we just don’t think of ourselves as being innovative as we go about our daily work.

To innovate, though, isn’t as overblown an action as it may sound. It just means “to begin or introduce something new.”

All it takes to be innovative is:

• Our idea for doing something in a new way
• Introducing it to others whose involvement or approval we need
• Setting it in motion once we have the okay

That’s not so hard, right?

Now, what is it again?

Innovative ideas, large or small, take many forms like a:

• Fix for things not functioning well
• New plan to refocus a faltering job
• Redesigned process that increases efficiency and effectiveness
• Workaround to keep work flowing until a lasting solution is achieved
• Message that reduces turmoil or raises optimism

In order to innovate, we need to:

• Look at our work with fresh eyes and see if there’s a better way
• Be willing to make an effort to influence our boss to accept our idea
• Overcome the fear that our idea may get rejected
• Accept accountability for our idea if it doesn’t work

Your innovativeness is a sign that solving the problem is personally important to you.

Inherent in innovation is your commitment to doing things right. Each of us has the power to innovate if and when we want to.

A draining idea 

I live in a 200-year-old, log farmhouse situated in a hollow where the water table is close to the surface. Most of my basement floor is dirt. During extended periods of drenching rain, the water table rises up and visits my basement.

This happens infrequently, but when it does, it’s a big issue. For years I managed the “big” water with three sump pumps and a French drain. But if the power went out I was literally sunk. (I’ve had as much as 3 ½ feet of water there.)

I explained the problem one dry summer’s day to my contractor, Pete. He asked to look over the situation and think about it. The next day he said, “I think I can fix your problem by creating a gravity-feed drain that runs from the lowest point in the basement, out to the street.

He set up his transit in the basement, shot the angle, hired two young guys to dig the inside trench, hired another guy with a backhoe to dig a trench to the street, laid the perforated pipe, and then we waited for two years.

You can see in the photo here that it worked amazingly. To me, Pete’s a hero.

What Pete did was innovation. He had an idea, introduced it to me (his customer), convinced me to go ahead, and took responsibility for the outcome. Not only did his problem-solving skills work, they saved me money and anxiety.

Why bother 

Each time you find a better way, you increase your value on the job. Your innovativeness becomes a major part of your personal brand identity, and it will likely create evolving:

• Buzz about you
• Exposure to movers and shakers
• Opportunities for unique assignments
• Recognition and reward
• More business

Of all the strengths that you can develop to enhance your career, innovativeness is likely to do the most for you. To be innovative is to effectively demonstrate such traits as problem- solving, analysis, influencing, initiative, and calculated risk-taking.

Whenever you can deliver an idea that makes the workplace and the business operate more effectively, you are contributing in ways that make you stand out. The more business fit you are, the more tools you have in place to bring out your inner innovator. Now go for it.

Self-Confidence Lost? 5 Steps to Getting It Back

Here one day and gone the next. It’s a fickle state—our self-confidence. The littlest thing can fuel it or snuff it out.                                     

Self-confidence is part of our brand identity. Our bosses and coworkers look for it, even evaluate it. It’s part of our behavioral attire, so we must do our best to wear it well. 

The fear of exposure 

The problem is that we’re not always self-confident. When we’re not, of course, we don’t want it to show. 

Revealing faltering confidence in our skills, leadership, and decisions can have devastating career effects. It can disarm our followers and give our detractors a target. 

So we do our best to cover up our declines in confidence. Too bad we can’t hide it from ourselves. 

Periods of lost self-confidence affect everyone, not just you and me. 

Highly accomplished, consistently successful, standard-setting individuals paid lots of money and given lots of public visibility lose self-confidence too. 

Take Roger Federer, for example: Professional tennis player who’s won a record five ATP World Tour Finals, 17 ATP Masters Series tournaments, an Olympic gold medal, and was once ranked number one in the world for a record 237 consecutive weeks. (Not bad, eh?) 

Now 30 years old and ranked #3 in the world (still not bad!), Federer, recently played in the Western & Southern Open Cincinnati, a key tournament leading to the U.S. Open in New York City.

 Steve Tignor from Tennis.com wrote these observations reflecting on Federer’s self-confidence:

“Before his first match in Cincy… Federer talked about his nerves coming into the event, about how he didn’t want to go out in the first round…It’s not as if Federer had suddenly decided to bare his soul…But the emphasis was different. Federer was more open about both his anxiety and his desire to get back on a winning track.”

No matter how many past successes we’ve achieved, self-confidence is about how we’ll perform today and tomorrow. It’s about what we want to achieve going forward.

Fortunately, we can draw on our past successes, no matter how big or small, to help us restore self-confidence.

Getting it back

We’re all up against the inner battle to sustain our self-confidence, especially as we try to advance our careers.

Here are some steps to help regain self-confidence lost:

1. Face it—Denial gets you nowhere, except perhaps in a deeper hole. When your confidence flags, get busy figuring out the cause—a situation, a look, something said, your own reactions, or a disappointed expectation. Once you know the cause, you can address it.
2. Dig in—The best remedy for fractured self-confidence is action. You may need to rework an assignment, re-learn a policy or practice, talk to a mentor or trusted coworker, redo your plan, or put yourself out there. Take charge.
3. Buck up—Remind yourself that this will pass. Focus on what you’ve learned, what you did well and can do more of, and how to position your next move to generate a more desirable outcome. Tomorrow’s another day.
4. Reach out—Find a positive person who’s successfully experienced career ups and downs, someone who can offer useful perspectives to help you. A success coach, mentor, or other advisor may be good for you and happy to help.
5. Connect—Being with others keeps us from wallowing. Our associations feed our perspectives, distract us from our worries, and keep us moving. Holing up in your office or avoiding interactions adds to the isolation that often comes when our self-confidence is low.

Take heart.

We talk about losing self-confidence like it’s a permanent state. If that were so, there would be no comebacks. Our job is to be good stewards of our self-confidence, being careful not to neglect it, give it away, or allow it to take a long holiday.

No matter how dreary things might seem, there’s always reason to take heart and grab hold. Forward you go!

 Photo from Cristian V. via Flickr

Don’t Get Too Big for Your “Bossypants.” Tina Fey Says So.

It happens. One day you wake up and you’re the boss. Suddenly, all the pieces came together and you’re in charge whether you prepared for the moment or not.                     

This happened, in a fashion, to Tina Fey, comedy writer and comedienne, known for her work on Saturday Night Live and 30 Rock. As a woman in comedy, she faced unique career obstacles, particularly from some male comics who were commited to the notion that “women aren’t funny.”  She’s clearly debunked that. 

In her book, Bossypants, Fey writes about her family dynamics and career path, sharing her often tongue-in-cheek discoveries about what it takes to be the boss—actually a good boss. 

Do you have what it takes? 

Overcoming preconceived notions is often a boss’s toughest assignment.   

Fey writes: “…ever since I became an executive producer of 30 Rock, people have asked me, ‘Is it hard for you, being the boss?’ and ‘Is it uncomfortable for you to be the person in charge?’ You know, in the same way they say, ‘Gosh, Mr. Trump, is it awkward for you to be the boss of all these people?’ I can’t answer for Mr. Trump, but in my case it is not.” 

It’s one thing to be confident and another to be arrogant when you’re the boss. 

Fey adds, “Contrary to what I believed as a little, girl, being the boss almost never involves marching around, waving your arms, and chanting, ‘I am the boss! I am the boss!’”  

There are plenty of bosses out there all puffed up about their importance, power, and authority. They’re wearing the bossypants we’d like to set on fire. 

Good bosses focus their attention on what it takes to help employees do their jobs well with the least amount of hassle, and not about their royal boss-ness. 

It’s about the cast. 

In many ways, employees are the boss’s supporting cast. Without them nothing gets done.  

According to Fey, “In most cases being a good boss means hiring talented people and then getting out of their way.”

 Hiring is the most important task for any boss. Good hires build cohesive teams, ensure quality performance, and develop a bench. 

When bosses hire well, they make their lives easier, but only if they know how to lead, delegate, and provide feedback. When their bossypants are too tight, bosses micro-manage, interfere, and criticize. 

Hence Fey’s “Bossypants Lesson #183: You Can’t Boss People Around If They Don’t Really Care.” 

Seeing the real picture 

Things are not always what they‘re said to be in any career and that was certainly true for Fey. She writes in Bossypants: 

“This is what I tell young women who ask me for career advice. People are gong to try to trick you. To make you feel that you are in competition with one another. ‘You’re up for a promotion. If they go with a woman, it’ll be between you and Barbara.’ Don’t be fooled. You’re not in competition with other women. You’re in competition with everyone.” 

That’s career revelation number one. Then she writes: 

“When faced with sexism or ageism or lookism … ask yourself the following question: ‘Is this person in between me and what I want to do?’ If the answer is no, ignore it and move on. Your energy is better used doing your work and outpacing people that way….

 If the answer is yes…Do your thing and don’t care if they like it.” 

You are your own boss, whether you admit it to yourself or not. You own the job you do for your employer for as long as you have it. 

Make your bossypants fit you. 

Your life is your business, making you a full-fledged entrepreneur, controlling all the choices that impact your life. You might also be the boss by position in your organization. 

If you’re wearing bossypants that are too big or too small, you may need to make a switch.  Finding the right fit can make a big difference.

Photo from George Arriola via Flickr