CONFIDENCE & COMPETENCE – Mind the Gap

It is seldom that confidence is defined without a reference to other people. Confidence puts you in front of an audience – there often are beneficiaries. Confidence is nurtured as we grow, competence is the set of skills we get trained for. Naturally, confidence comes before competence.

In business or the workplace (‘the professional setup’), the purpose is more to DO than to TALK, even in the business of talking. As such, how we define confidence in that setup should also incorporate an element of DOING. That is why I strongly suggest that confidence and competence should be looked at as a package when evaluating performance in the professional setup.

What are the dangers of one existing without the other?

When your confidence is not backed by competence – you risk showing compromised integrity, in that you cannot back up your words with the requisite action, and you lose trust even on the things that you may actually be competent for. When you have competence but are not confident – you do not get the right credit for your work, you get overlooked for opportunities and you consequently feel unseen.

How do you build confidence?

You need to unlearn some of the teachings you were given while you were young. For example, you need to call people by their first names, regardless of their age. Develop an understanding and comfort that to address certain issues in the professional setup or just to be heard, you need to step out of your personal values that do not serve the ‘professional you’. Another way is to begin acknowledging people. This goes beyond the occasional greeting that is followed by silence. Get to know people on a personal front and get rid of the assumptions. You might realise they are not actually judging you in those meetings, they might just be more reserved.

How do you build competence?

For technical roles this is relatively easier – you need to know the rule book. Not only the rule book text but how it applies to your workplace context. It is more colourful for non-technical roles. You need to work on your professional relationship management skills. This includes how you speak, how you show up, how you keep relationships alive when the project is finished for example, etc. It is quite strange, but also so true, that in the professional setup competence is normally attached to your name once people get to know you personally.

Call-to-action for leaders

You hire for competence but you train into your people a higher level of confidence than when you first met them. As I have tried to show above, there is difference between personal confidence and the confidence you need for the professional setup. How you give responsibility as a leader can inspire or kill confidence. You cannot micro-manage your direct reports into full confidence, for example. We have a duty to the people under our care to develop their confidence by building on their competence something that can be transferred into their future roles. Experience is not simply a collection of competences, but a development of an ability to execute under different circumstances. Its best trainer is the instilling of confidence.