Some Thoughts About Confidence

During my first shows, I told our listeners about 5.5 facts job hunters need to remember when preparing for jobs. One of the things I mentioned was that companies hire confidence. Companies want confident people.

At that time, I promised that I would do a show about how people can increase their confidence for their job interviews. But until now, I haven’t.

A few weeks ago, I remember a person sent me an SMS asking the same question. At that time I also promised I would talk about it. But still I didn’t

This week, I received some messages at my email jobwarriors@gmail.com. One of writers asked the same question: how can I increase my confidence for the job interview?

I figure I better keep my promise and today tell our listeners a few things they can do to increase their confidence in preparing for the job interview.

But as always, let’s begin with a question to you: How would you define confidence?

To me, confidence is the belief in the ability to solve problems, to learn, and to ultimately achieve my goals.

Confidence knows how to do something. And it is the belief that I have the potential to do something.

Do you think confidence is something that people are born with, or is it something that we are taught?

I believe it can be taught. I believe some people learn it earlier, some later.

Today, it’s important to know that if you are feeling a lack of confidence. Do not despair. You have hope. It will take some work, but you can get through this lack.

Why is confidence important?

Companies want people who know how to work well with others. They want people who are happy. Confident people tend to be happy. They are the more productive people. And let's face it...confidence sells. It inspires confidence. Other people trust confident people.

So what makes a person confident?

Confidence comes when we feel good about ourselves, when we think we can accomplish things, when we think that we have ability and value. A lack of confidence comes when we basically feel the opposite.

A lack of confidence can really hurt our chances in a job interview. A lack of confidence effects our body language, our words, and our passion. We really need to develop confidence if we want to get a good job, and if we want to have a happy life and love life.

So how do we get confidence for a job interview?

The first thing we need to do is learn to be nice to yourself. Stop torturing yourself with unrealistic expectations. We are all trying so hard to be superstars. Realize that it takes time and slow progress to become the super success that we all really want to become. Be nice to yourself, and allow yourself the freedom to relax and just enjoy the process.

Let go of the results. Let go of the expectations. Stop trying to control the outcome. Do your best, try your best, prepare your best and practice your best, but let go. Realize there is only so much you and I can do. We are powerless to a point. We can control our behavior, actions and attitudes. What other people decide is up to us. Take positive action, and let go of the results.

Do the work! We feel confident when we research and learn as we know we are supposed to. Self-esteem, confidence comes from doing the Right thing. Acting lazy leads us into a mire of self-loathing and sadness. Positive constructive action leads us into health and happiness. Researching the company and industry and job is a powerful action that will yield great results. Knowledge is power. And power communicates confidently!

Practice. Practice Practice. Don’t get caught without having prepared yourself for the interview. Don’t be rigid in memorizing your answers, but know how to answer nearly all of them quickly and easily. Practice makes perfect. And it’s a very important tool.

Perfect your service sales pitch. Think of five things you want to leave your interviewer remembering about you. Perfect this. Remember to focus your words on your audience. Think “What can I do for you”. This perspective really helps us get the focus off of ourselves and what we want, and puts it onto the people who can give us a job. We want to help the company. No ONLY received the job. So perfect your service pitch.

Show up to the interview. Half the battle of confidence is won just by showing up. The same for preparation etc. Just show up. Do your best. So many people let their thoughts and worries and doubts keep them from trying. Showing up and doing something is better than 90% of the people in the world.

Stop comparing yourself to others. We never win when we compare ourselves to others. We feel inferior almost always. Or we feel superior. Either way it’s a losing game. Stop it. Compare yourself with you. You are the one you have to spend your life with. Learn to love and watch and enjoy your own progress. Don’t get caught up thinking about others. It usually always drags our confidence into the dirt.

Realize your truth. You are awesome. You graduated from university. You’re smart. You have skills. The job market wants you. Yes you need to prepare and work your butt off to get the job, but you can do it, and the market will reward your hard work.
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. I mean don’t rest all your hopes on “the one job”. Consider job hunting and interviewing as an adventure, filled with many chances for you to learn about yourself, companies, and other people. You’ll see a lot of people doing strange things and thinking strange thoughts during the process. Enjoy it. Learn from it.

Let go of unrealistic expectations. Dashed hopes have a way of creating HUGE resentment. Resentment?anger?will kill your confidence. We only have so much energy, and if we are thinking about our anger, we misuse our energy. We should be focusing on what we can do to solve our joblessness problem, not on how the company we wanted threw us away like trash.

Focus on the solution, not the problem. The solution to low confidence is action. Positive constructive action. Thoughts follow action, so don’t let them stop you from doing what you need to do.

Finally, learn from your mistakes. Go out and make mistakes!!!! Please! Perfectionism is a thing of the past. Get with the new. Become imperfect. Love your imperfection. Embrace it. Smile at it. Because you are all awesome!!! So go out, try your best, if you fail, enjoy it. Learn from it. Educate yourself, and change.

This is a tonne of information for you to absorb. I’d love to go over any of these further with you. Please write me at jobwarriors@gmail.com. Thanks for listening.

You can have confidence!!! You can and you are already on your way. Thanks for reading. All for today! Keep up the fight!

Michael Jay…out!