[00:00:00] Hi everyone, my name's Dex Randall, and this is the Burnout to Leadership podcast, where I teach professional men to recover from burnout and get back to passion and reward at work.

[00:00:22] Hello, my friends, this is Dex welcome to this week's episode Burnout Recovery Power Tool number six in a series of ten. And today we're going to talk about mastering confidence. You can visit the power tools page in the show notes to review the first five power tools if you've missed them or listen to the podcast from episode 155.

[00:00:46] Otherwise, we'll come back to confidence. Which I think we can define as the belief or conviction that an outcome will be favourable. I'll take some more of that, how about you? Really, I think confidence is so fundamental to our well being and also so multifaceted that it's almost a language or an idiom of its own in the body, in the psyche.

[00:01:14] Think about your confidence yourself. How many aspects of it affect your well being and your work and your social connections? We're going to focus mostly today on self confidence, but in burnout, you're also likely to have weak confidence in your world and the people in it to support and sustain you.

[00:01:39] No worries, both types of confidence can be rebuilt. And if you are in burnout, whatever got you there, by the way, is not a salient factor. Burnout can happen to any high achiever and the events that bring people here are very common and they do not define their worth. In a survey this year, 2020, actually it's 2024 now, by Employment Hero,

[00:02:04] over 60 percent of workers in Australia, where I live, said they had experienced burnout in the last three months. This surely points to global rather than personal drivers. The main point is, if you're burning out, get help. Let's help you recover quick smart. And you can start to do that using these power tools in this series.

[00:02:27] So let's begin today by assessing your self confidence, shall we for a minute? I'm going to run through here some of the many types of self confidence that affect people in burnout. And I'll ask you some questions and answer those questions for yourself. Picking option A or option B, this is the upside or downside of confidence, to reveal your level of confidence in each area.

[00:02:53] So the first one is interpersonal confidence. This is about you. Are you pro social or do you tend to isolate? That's the two extremes of confidence. Number two, performance or results confidence. Are you a perfectionist or does solution quality evade you? Number three, speaking and presenting.

[00:03:18] Do you calmly promote and articulate your views? or become flustered and silence yourself. Number four, planning confidence. Do you plan for and meet your commitments or do you struggle to schedule work appropriately for your role and get it done? Number five, task completion. Do you get what's important or urgent done each week, or do you push tasks around your plate?

[00:03:44] Number six time, do you stick to your work schedule? Or missed deadlines. Number seven, delegation and collaboration. Are you a natural integrator, a multiplier, or do you avoid dealing with people dynamics?

[00:04:03] Professional confidence. Number eight, do you stand in your professionalism or withdraw with imposter syndrome? Nine, money. Are you a good money manager or a bit disorganized? 10. Personal confidence. Do you mostly believe in yourself, your qualities and worthiness or doubt, judge and criticize yourself?

[00:04:26] Number 11, values. Do you know what your values are and stick to them, or do you blow a little bit in the wind? Number 12, strategic confidence. Do you make solid, rational, top level decisions? Or do you lack conviction and forethought? So there are my 12 areas that I've picked out, kind of randomly really, that affect work and burnout.

[00:04:51] How did you go with those questions? Of those 12, if you've got more A's than B's, then really you've got a workable base amount of confidence, perhaps with specific areas that you'd like to improve. If you had, on the other hand, more B's than A's, how do you feel about yourself right now? Because possibly, you have a leeching effect from a mind that's unwilling to give you much credit for any of your actual skills or merit or decency or worth.

[00:05:25] And really, if that's happening for you, that's burnout. Recruiting your inner critic to wreak spurious havoc on your self esteem. Luckily for all of us, it's a straightforward step by step process to bring your brain back up to speed on what a talented, generous, hard working and dedicated person you actually are.

[00:05:48] It does take some time to practice, these are new skills, but it's perfectly doable and it will change your life experience considerably. So stick with me, let's go through some of the tools that you can use. And of course, there are many more types of confidence than the 12 I mentioned, but the list is food for thought if you're in burnout, allowing self doubt, hesitancy, avoidance, and people pleasing to rule your behaviours, particularly at work.

[00:06:19] Because I see confidence as one of the deal breakers in burnout, keeping your head under water. No confidence, no professional thriving. The good news though, Burnout Recovery Coaching restores a huge amount of confidence in yourself and in the world. Confidence, after all, is merely perception, it's not fact.

[00:06:43] And if you're burning out, chances are you grew up feeling a bit inadequate and you've tried hard all your life to compensate. If that hasn't worked, It isn't the end of the story. You're a savvy human, a hyper autonomous super achiever, no doubt, revival is available. But you really need to cultivate a sufficient sense of safety to be willing to hook back in with people.

[00:07:12] Because a human is not designed physiologically to work in isolation and cannot thrive alone. So today, let's consider a few basic points about confidence. Number one. Why burnout affects confidence. You probably already know this, but chronic stress, anxiety, self doubt, self criticism and exhaustion can lead to diminished self esteem and imposter syndrome.

[00:07:39] And if you're wondering what the signs of lost confidence are in this context, things like difficulty making decisions and sharing opinions; a prevailing sense of overwhelm; paralysis, slow to take action and complete tasks; avoidance of challenges; reduced communication and connection with others; less willingness to be seen;

[00:08:04] left brain functioning is a good one, you're analytical but maybe a little cold or detached; refuting praise, that's an indicator, or feeling inadequate despite achievements; over focusing on what's wrong or missing; excessive fear and dread for the future. Because burnout really is about losing your invincibility as the fixer.

[00:08:26] It's a vulnerable space. Any high achieving professional will struggle with confidence during burnout. You're not alone. In burnout then, working to rebuild confidence will be time very well spent. Point number two, confidence is built, not innate. Shift your mindset from "I'm not confident" to "I can develop confidence".

[00:08:52] One of my clients, Max, was routinely terrified of sharing his medical opinion in group rounds early in his medical career. And it was actually more of a fear of public speaking and shame than being wrong. I mean he's a bright guy and we worked to create more flexibility in his expectation that he always had to give the right answer, in the right words, very quickly.

[00:09:20] That it was actually just okay to blurt out his best effort and learn as he went along and that in fact is all anyone could do. Confidence grows through small wins, learning and practice like any other skill. Point number three then, small wins rebuild confidence by themselves. Focus on incremental progress, break tasks down into smaller, achievable and probably less daunting goals.

[00:09:50] And that's it. However you make progress, celebrate every single small success. It is really critical to reinforcing your skills, knowing that progress, not perfection, rebuilds confidence. So when you're doing this, be abundantly generous with yourself. Celebrate your wins in writing at the end of every day.

[00:10:14] Because expressing gratitude to yourself stimulates dopamine. This is our reward and motivation neurotransmitter. And stimulates serotonin, which is our happiness and mood control neurotransmitter. And both of those program your subconscious mind to create more wins. See Atomic Habits by James Clear for more on the joy and effectiveness of small wins.

[00:10:43] Point number four. Challenge negative self talk.

[00:10:46] I bet you saw this one coming. So it really is important for us all to develop the facility for noticing self critical thoughts as they come up. Recognize your inner critic and simply question the validity of what it says and then reframe with self compassion. Replace for example, "I failed" with "This is a learning opportunity" because that's a switch with no downside.

[00:11:15] If you'd like you can download the limiting opinions worksheet in this episode's Power Tools page to record and reframe what your inner critic says. Next time it chimes in then you will have more options about what you want to believe. Really this process defangs your inner critic which is not after all a source of truth.

[00:11:38] Only witless prejudice. As a professional, you get to write your own truth and now it's your turn to do that. For more on this topic as well, see Power Tool number three on bypassing your inner critic or listen to podcast episode 158. Point number five, again fairly obvious, lean on your strengths. If when you heard me say that, your mind is telling you, right now that you don't have any, that's a prime example of not listening to your inner critic.

[00:12:09] It's a load of old tosh. Of course you have so many excellent qualities. So lean on your strengths, highlight past successes, reflect on moments when you've overcome challenges or created success in the past. As a quick exercise you can create what I call a Professional Impact Portfolio, listing your achievements, your skills and the qualities that make you such a capable person.

[00:12:34] Write this like your best friend would write it, with a generous heart. And if you take a little bit of warm up to get there, start with all the tiny simple things and build up. I suggest you task yourself to find at least a hundred. I beg you don't skimp on this one. Nobody's judging and it's a wonderful gift to self.

[00:12:56] Imagine you are doing this exercise for your child self who really craves the attention and recognition and you're the person who can give it to them. Point number six, build self trust through action because action builds confidence. Taking small consistent actions towards your goal reinforces your belief in your abilities.

[00:13:21] Plus, It's the only way to get big goals done. Because remember Edison and his 3, 000 attempts to produce a light bulb. His work was actually preceded by 70 years of work by other inventors. Make things easy on yourself. Experiment with low stakes risks. Take small actions for say 15 minutes, but do it every single day.

[00:13:45] Step slightly outside your comfort zone, if you want to experience success. Just have a go. Throw spaghetti at the wall, some of it will stick. Allow confidence to progress and build in this way. Point number seven. Set boundaries or say no to protect your energy. Confidence grows with self respect. I can't stress this one enough.

[00:14:14] Perhaps you can recognize in yourself if this is missing, or a bit lower than it could be. Because setting and enforcing boundaries reinforces your sense of agency and self worth. And no one can really value you higher than you value yourself. It has to start with you. And if you're a bit leery about this one, then please know, setting boundaries or saying a reasoned and calm no has no offensive or rejecting quality about it.

[00:14:46] It's not blamey or shouty or angry. It enhances rather than diminishes relationships because now you're speaking your truth with dignity, respecting yourself and the other person. It's simply an expression of your professionalism. You can download the boundaries worksheet in this episode's

[00:15:10] power tool page to improve the quality of both your yes and your no answers to requests. And listen to podcast episode number 21 on setting boundaries. Also listen to episode 12 on the paradigm shift to effective leadership -saying no. As you begin to set better boundaries and say no where you need to, you really will assume your proper place in the world.

[00:15:38] You'll enhance your decision making and raise your professional and leadership standards, garnering respect from others. This is the opposite of burnout, where you might have extreme reluctance to say no, even to requests that deserve a no. Prioritizing your needs by saying no appropriately sends confidence signals to your subconscious to treat you well in the future.

[00:16:07] And if you want to read up on how to say no elegantly, read Essentialism by Greg McKeown. Point number eight. Choose to adopt a growth mindset. Before you throw tomatoes at me, I know you already understand this, but in burnout it might not be front of mind or even readily accessible. Yet confidence thrives on learning.

[00:16:31] Remember your human need for meaning, growth and reward. Remember how good it feels to accomplish things. So when you frame setbacks as growth opportunities rather than failures, you're automatically in a growth mindset and this fuels your momentum. Be very gentle of course with yourself about failures.

[00:16:53] They are not excuses for self flagellation. You can download the Failure Worksheet on this episode's Power Tools page to self assess on how you respond to failure, what you tell yourself, and how you might choose to respond in the future, in order to learn, grow, and of course enjoy your progress more, and build more confidence and self esteem.

[00:17:18] Point number nine. Confidence Ladder. Sometimes we can't eat the whole elephant. So if you've got a task that's a little bit daunting to do, a bigger goal, break down that goal into manageable steps to achieve incremental progress and take encouragement as you see yourself moving forward. You can download the confidence ladder worksheet on the episode's Power Tool page to get started.

[00:17:46] And the steps for doing this are, number one, choose a goal where you currently lack confidence. Let's say, for example, speaking up in meetings. Break that into small manageable steps, ranking them from the easiest at the top to the hardest at the bottom. And take action on the first step and start to build momentum.

[00:18:07] And of course, don't forget to celebrate your wins every time. So an example of the steps for speaking up in meetings might be step one, share one idea in a small group meeting, difficulty three. When you've done that, step two, offer a suggestion in a large meeting, difficulty five. And then once you've done that, step three, lead a portion of the next team meeting, difficulty seven.

[00:18:36] So use the worksheet and see how that can work for you. Make sure to cut it up into small bites so you don't make it too difficult on yourself.

[00:18:44] Okay, that's what I have for you today. If you yourself are in burnout and would like some support with that, In coaching, come and talk to me for free and let's make a plan for you to recover quickly and sustainably and get back to your best performance, leadership, success, and most of all enjoyment inside work and out.

[00:19:05] You can book an appointment at DexRandall. com. If you enjoyed this episode, please help me reach more people in burnout by rating and reviewing the podcast and sharing the podcast with your friends that were also experiencing burnout. Thank you so much for listening. Power tool number seven next week is on relationships.

[00:19:24] Another heavy hitter. You won't want to miss that one, if you have any measure of conflict or pressure in your personal or work relationships. Don't forget to do the worksheets from today and start creating real change now. Catch you next time.