Managing the Dark Side of Confidence!
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Do you need to manage someone who is very confident, yet at times borders on arrogance? The secret to getting the best from them is to equip them with great listening skills.
Confidence in business is a must – without it bold courageous decisions will not be taken, self-doubt will overwhelm any business plan, and challenges will be seen as problems rather than opportunities! We need confidence to take charge of difficult situations and provide the leadership for people who prefer to follow.
At their best, confident people are happy to take the lead, energetic, socially confident, often charming, able to network and make useful business connections. They often have the goal-orientation and drive to be high-achievers. As they are often ambitions, they have a need to be well-regarded, to be seen as successful and multi-talented. They usually enjoy the status and trappings that success brings. They enjoy being consulted and their opinion sought.
However, when feeling stressed, confident types may try to deflect criticism by overwhelming others with their competence and achievements. They can over-estimate their abilities and forget the people and organisational context that supported those achievements. Confidence can turn to arrogance – people start to grab credit for group work, and stop listening to others, asking for feedback and considering anyone else’s opinion but their own!
What can you do about a team member whose confidence is becoming arrogance?
- Set them up with few sessions with a high-level mentor who they admire, and who you know has strong views on the importance of leaders listening, seeking feedback and understanding their own weaknesses and others’ strengths. Hearing this from a senior source will shape their view of leadership in a positive direction. You can combine this with a feedback exercise that can be discussed in the mentor meetings.
- Get them to seek thoughtful feedback from some key internal clients on their strengths and weaknesses – they can use T&P’s Strength Cards if you have them. It’s not the ‘rating’ of the weakness that’s important but the conversation where they discover how others perceive them, and helpful/unhelpful behaviours. Emphasise that ‘perception is reality’. They may find it more palatable to address the problem of ‘appearing arrogant’ than ‘being arrogant’!
- Develop their skills in accurate listening. Choose meetings where their natural behaviour is to get fully engaged and drive to influence decisions. Afterwards, get them to list all the key points made and the data or rationale given. How good are they at accurately listing the points other people made? Give them opportunities to practise falling into ‘listening and summarising mode’, and discuss when doing this adds to leadership. Ask them to summarise a discussion you’ve both taken part in. What did they hear and understand? How well does it compare to your own understanding of what was said and why? This will help their listening and empathy skills.
- If their career goals seem unrealistic, get them to discover reality for themselves – ask them to interview senior people about how they have driven their careers. This will establish more realism about how long things take, and demonstrate that sideways moves can be very beneficial and developmental.
Rather than taking on the task of personally chipping away at over-confidence, work to develop their listening skills, and encourage them to seek out honest feedback. If they understand that it is okay to admit mistakes and accept your weaknesses (as long as you value the support others can provide in these weaker areas) they will be able to develop as a well-rounded high achiever.
If you would like to know more about career derailers talk to Talent and Potential about this series and the Hogan Development Survey psychometric which can be used for both recruitment and development.