I have confidence in sunshine
I have confidence in rain
I have confidence that spring will come again
Besides which you see I have confidence in me!
The Sound Of Music - I Have Confidence
Ah that we would all be so confident!
And yet, many of us are not.
And of that many, most are women.
Enter journalists Katty Kay and Claire Shipman, who wondered why that was.
Their research has led to the interesting new book: The Confidence Code.
Chock-a-block with the most cutting edge research about the social, psychological and biological factors that play into whether or not someone has confidence, the book aims to understand why, all things being equal, men tend to over-estimate their abilities by 30% while women tend to under-estimate their abilities by around the same amount and what implications that has not only for the men and women involved, but for society as a whole.
I used to see this confidence gap manifested a lot in my former career.
Young bright women would doubt their hunches, second-guess their abilities, whereas their young male counterparts would brashly take a shot regardless.
Eventually, you take enough of those shots, you show enough chutzpah, you will make some big wins. And get promoted.
Too many women describe themselves as "lucky" when they do well, beat themselves up over every little mistake, and feel they must prepare twice as hard in order to be taken seriously.
I'm not going to give away much more about this book - it must be read and digested properly and I highly recommend you do so.
Despite achieving a lot professionally, I would often feel like I was a fraud, that somehow others were more intelligent or quicker than I was, and I was constantly questioning my abilities.
So it was a relief to see that I am in good company and the authors provide concrete tactics, based on research, as to how to address these feelings of inadequacy.
At the website for the book, you can take the confidence quiz. While many would consider me quite confident, in fact, I came out as having only medium confidence.
The description of medium confidence:
What does that mean?
It likely means one of two things. First, you might be generally in the middle range of the confidence spectrum regarding a variety of your judgments. Alternatively, you could be high in confidence on some matters but relatively low on others. That is, there are times when you do feel confident about your abilities, or confident about successfully addressing a challenge. But there may be other times when you may be risk-averse, or may choose inaction over action. You may also spend significant time ruminating—a huge confidence killer.
As soon as I got to the last sentence, I knew I was nailed. I am a terrible ruminator, and having just completed the Brene Brown course on whole-hearted living, this is my number one to-do: stop playing the endless negative loop in my mind, the coulda, shoulda, wouldas of every situation.
This is a wonderful book for:
- the person who wants to boost their confidence
- the person who wants to help mentor a person, particularly a female person, and help them gain confidence in their schooling or workplace.
- the person who wants to understand why we are still struggling to have women run for office, assume leadership roles, stay in leadership roles, etc.
I highly recommend this book and will be telling all of my girlfriends and the smart women and men in my life about it!
Some more thoughts on confidence by two woman I greatly admire:
You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” ― Eleanor Roosevelt
“The eyes of others our prisons; their thoughts our cages.” ― Virginia Woolf
And in the fake-it-till-you-make-camp (of which I excelled at times...)
How about you? Any struggles with confidence? Have you read this book yet?
Have a great day and stay safe out there!
xoxo wendy
Sounds like an interesting book. I just did that quiz and scored Low Confidence, which I guess surprised me a little. I like to think I'm confident, but according to the quiz I am not, although I think it depends on how I'm feeling on any particular day.
ReplyDeleteI'm definitely going to look out for that book!
Ruth - I think you would find it interesting, considering where you work. And I think you are right - depending upon the day and the issue, it can change, but there is apparently a core of confidence, that can definitely be built upon.
DeleteWell that was an interesting quiz. It was actually a bit irritating with the questions...especially since I just spent the week end in Columbus, OH and they wanted to know the population. That was weird. How'd they know? I have always gone with the motto "go with your gut and never second guess yourself" and "head up, keep moving forward." Thanks for the review.
ReplyDeleteI bet you are high confidence!
DeleteThe book sounds interesting. I came out as highly confident according to the quiz, which is strange. I am a confident person, but I think maybe that comes from being optimistic - I tend to assume everything will work out. I also don't second guess my decision making a lot. Sure, I make mistakes, but I don't dwell on them. Hopefully I'm not blindly self confident?? hmmmm......
ReplyDeleteHeidi - I think you'd find it interesting - the authors differentiate between confidence, optimism and self-esteem and while the latter two feed into confidence, it appears most is based on mastery! I had confidence in my old job, but I still second-guessed myself constantly and was so hard on myself!
DeleteYou know what I've always been a quick decision maker with a very strong confidence in those decisions, I also overestimate my abilities and strengths at times, which is not really a good trait but maybe with a different life it would have worked out?
ReplyDeleteI'm stubborn which is why I stick to those decisions no probs.
I might read this book to give me some clues on helping my older daughter with confidence, she's way smarter than I ever was but doesn't have that strength of decision that I have always had, if we could combine the two we could maybe take over the world!
Thanks for the review Wendy I'm going to order this book tonight. Now I'm off to watch Long Island Medium my favourite show, take about intuition!!
ha! Do you have high levels of testosterone? They talk about that too! And I wonder if overly-confident parents (including myself in that camp) sometimes end up creating less confident kids because we have such a tendency to want to make decisions for everybody? I sure fall into that trap! You watch Long Island Medium? I have never seen that.
DeleteMLane will make any decisions you are waffling on, counsel you through, kindly and patiently review all the options and then affirm your choice. He is amazing at this, but I have to counsel him to let the girls make their own choices; he thinks he does, but they sometimes disagree! Must check out this book.
DeleteI resemble that remark...
DeleteI don't think I have any testosterone as I am quite wimpy physically, but I am very much like my Dad in personality and he was always making snap decisions which drove me mad as a teenager, we fought like the dickens but now see eye to eye on everything which is interesting. My oldest and youngest don't listen to a word I say, they are both highly confident in their abilities to the point of being stubborn like their mother. I think G's confidence is a personality trait but I would love some help with it as she gets older, I'd hate to think I kept her from being confident by being quick with decisions. Oh the guilt!!
Deletethere's that old genetics again!
DeleteVery timely topic especially with all the fuss of Ms' Shipman's & Kay's journalist colleague Jill Abramson being unceremoniously fired from the New York Times with her management style cited as what did her in. I have always been impressed with Ms. Abramson and she's a fighter so can't wait to see how this pans out. It will get very messy for the NYT as the guy that fired her the heir A.O. Sulzberger Jr. is a lightweight who had almost nobody's respect.
ReplyDeleteI'd love to hear how they arrived at a figure of 30% over or under confident of men vs. women. Mine will spike after only 3 beers.
GSL - I have been reading all about that this weekend. How ironic that this is happening the same week Barbara Walters retires. You will have to read the book re: the research - was all based on tests, etc, but I am NOT confident enough to explain that to you! ;-) 3 beers eh?
DeleteWhen I know that I'm right I'm confident, when I'm good on background and on facts I'm confident, and when I know I will never have to answer for what I say, I'm confident. Example, a friend and I were meeting our husbands for dinner, and we were early so sat at the bar. Two guys wouldn't leave us alone, and finally got loud. "You really should go away," I said confidently, "our husbands will be here in a few minutes." "Yeah, what do they do?"
ReplyDelete"Oh, they've been friends since high school, her husband is a police captain and mine's had some good luck and is a tight end for the Eagles."
(confident smile).
They put money on the bar and left.
I would never have tried this at work, btw.
We are all v. upset about Jill and are glad she has spoken out. Gender discrim cases usually turn on statistics, and we are sure they will support her position.
Fred - you are living the book! It is exactly what they say!
DeleteI got medium confidence but I think that is partly from being beaten down. I was really confident which was partly a trait I learned from my outgoing Australian "no worries" but do your best so your team wins attitude. I do wonder if confidence is partly cultural. This is something that each country I notice responds to very differently and also there is the added layer of confidence received and perceived by both sexes.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly on the quiz it told me - dont fake it till you make it!!!
Naomi - there does appear to be a cultural component for sure.
DeleteThere was a huge section on the different biological wiring of men and women's brains - which the authors themselves really struggled with - and how some of our wiring makes us naturally want to work in teams versus be lone wolves...
Hello Wendy,
ReplyDeleteIn our teaching days which began in a very challenging secondary school, one learned that confidence was the way to survive in the classroom. Children are like animals, they detect fear and uncertainty and move in for the kill. So, the only way to survive at the chalk face was to convince that one knew exactly what one was doing (even if in reality one did not) and that we would all achieve success together! Well, it worked for all our careers!
After all the talk of emancipation, it is still true that women do not generally reach the pinnacle of their potential. Indeed, we often said that it would only be when mediocre women reached the top of their profession that one could really say that they had achieved equality with men.
This book sounds like a most interesting read.
Jane and Lance - you are right on about the mediocre comment and your thoughts on the classroom made me laugh out loud!
DeleteWhile I am an Obama fan, I often wonder how the US would be doing if people have felt more comfortable putting forth a female candidate 6 years ago...
I could talk about this for 3 days! Don't worry, I won't. I think I am quite confident at this point; in my 20's I was terrified 60% of the time, but pretended not to be and "leaned in". Figuring out one's competence is key.
ReplyDeleteLane - I hear you! Though the authors do not at all espouse the 'fake it till you make it" approach, I admit to using it now and then and always forcing myself to speak up and sit at the head of the table whenever I chaired a meeting, something I see women not do enough...
DeleteOh and we take everything PERSONALLY! Men almost never take things personally...
DeleteI haven't read the book, but I took the test out of curiosity. Turns out I have higher than average confidence.
ReplyDeleteI guess I still have some work to do. :D
Happy Victoria Day!
Rose - you made me laugh!
DeleteInteresting. I did the quiz and came out "medium" as well. I have 2 daughters one of whom is very confident and one who is constantly questioning herself. # 2 is definitely a ruminator. Same genes, same environment, why so different??
ReplyDeleteFunny, isn't it? Although I guess we may not have exactly the same genes and then there are our life experiences. It is a riddle for sure!
DeleteI'm rebuilding my confidence so this looks like a great book. I think I fall into the fake it till you make it camp. People always think I'm ridiculously confident, which always strikes me as funny.
ReplyDeleteThis book has my name stamped all over it. Heading up to take the quiz and will be ordering it.
ReplyDeleteWhy am I surprised I ranked highness confidence?? Still buying the book. Thanks Wendy for the tip.
DeleteThe quiz gave me "high confidence," which I guess is neither a surprise nor a non-surprise. I don't think I've ever really thought before about whether I would consider myself a "confident" or "not confident" person. I do find myself sometimes saying things that kind of undercut myself, but on reflection, I think this actually isn't a lack of confidence so much as perhaps an overabundance of ego, and I want to come off perhaps a bit more modestly? But I think it isn't really a very helpful habit, and one I would like to eliminate.
ReplyDelete