Corporate Survivor with Mei Phing : Career Growth In The Corporate World - Ep231: How to trust yourself (without imposter syndrome).

Episode Date: November 21, 2024

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Welcome to the Corporate Survivor Podcast, where we talk about how to grow your career confidence, build your skills and value, increase your salary, and the many lessons we learn in the corporate world. For more career support, click on over to www.mayping.com. This is Mayping, your corporate leader turned career coach. I hope you enjoy, like and subscribe. How do I feel more confident at work and in my career? How do I develop real inner confidence so that I don't feel like an imposter at work all the time? So welcome, welcome back to Corporate Survivor Podcast.

It's me, Mei Ping, ex-corporate leader turned career coach and founder of the Corporate Survivor, the ultimate career program for 9 to 5 professionals just like you. So for more info on what I do, you can go to www.mayping.com. Okay, so today I'm going to be answering the critical question around how do you develop real career confidence? So many of the online tips that you find out there, I find that it's more focused on like the physical elements, right? So you get tips such as like, you know, stand a little bit straighter, speak a little bit louder, which may or may not be helpful. But today, let's actually dig deeper and dive deeper into the real root causes as to why some people appear more confident than others. And some people feel so much more confident as

compared to someone else who has poor confidence and very, very low, like serious confidence issues. Now, after working with hundreds of members in my career program, The Corporate Survivor, as well as dealing and talking to thousands of people in my community online, and also based on my personal experience of like more than 10 years in the corporate world, rising the career ladder, there are basically two categories that will determine whether you have real career confidence or not. So I want you to figure out, right, and bucket yourself, which category do you feel that you relate to the most? Now, as I said, there are two not. So I want you to figure out and bucket yourself, which category do you feel that you relate to the most? Now, as I said, there are two categories. So category number one

is what I call the hoping category. So it's like, I don't feel very confident, but I hope that my conversation with my boss is going to be okay. I hope that this stakeholder is going to listen to me. I hope that my performance review is going listen to me. I hope that my performance review is going to be good. I hope I get a good bonus this year. I hope I get that new job. So as you can see here, category one is all about hoping. It's like, okay, I'm not really sure, but I'm really taking the action and I hope that it's going to work out. Now, category number two, right, it's more focused around knowing, right? So what do I mean by knowing? Knowing is that no matter what happens, right? Anything that happened at the workplace, right? Along your career

journey or even along your job search journey, you know exactly how to handle that situation. So for example, if you feel like I need to go and talk to my boss, you will not feel nervous and you'll feel confident if you know these are some of the key things that you need to go and talk to my boss. You will not feel nervous and you'll feel confident if you know these are some of the key things that you need to be updating your boss every week or depending on whatever frequency. So it's like you have a template, you have a cadence that you can follow to and therefore you're approaching that conversation with your boss or with any stakeholder, any client or even during an interview process. It's like you're following the step-by-step, knowing that, okay, if I focus on these key things, then I always can prepare

because I know these are the key things that will be discussed. These are the key updates that I need to give. And therefore, it allows me to prepare. And the more that you can prepare, the more that you can gain the details, you get clearer around the message that you want to convey, you want to communicate, articulate, the more confident that you will feel. And giving you another example. So some people say, okay, you know, but maybe how can I get confident when I go and talk to a different stakeholder at my workplace? Okay, again, it's down to the difference between hoping, whether are you just going to randomly call up a stakeholder and then get disappointed when you don't get the specific document that you're requesting for, or if you're in the second category of knowing, whereby you know

that maybe on a monthly basis, on a bi-weekly basis, you need this specific piece of document from this specific stakeholder, and you actively build a relationship and you convey expectations, you network accordingly, you send information that is required, you make clear timelines, and therefore, it makes it really, really easy for you to request for a certain document because the stakeholder already knows that, okay, right, on the first of every month, maybe he's going to be looking up for this document, and this is something I need to send to her, right? So, this is what I call knowing. Now, let's talk about it in the context of job search. Now, I find that many job seekers are very hopeful in general, and that's a good thing, right, to be enthusiastic and hopeful. Like I said, the second thing is that

like if you want to think about it in a category, like, sorry, in the second category of knowing, right, that is the matter of like, okay, I know what kind of jobs I'm applying for. I know what kind of roles that will be the most suitable for my background experiences and skills. And I apply accordingly for that specific jobs that I know that I will be a great candidate because I have all the boxes. I have learned how to articulate my value and I can make sure that when I'm talking to HR recruiter and hiring manager, I can communicate my value accordingly. That's knowing. That's not going into an interview, applying for random jobs and then feeling disappointed as to why you don't get a response and whatever, not know. The concept about knowing gives you a lot of confidence because

you have already decided. It's like you have already had some time for self-reflection, self-assessment, and then to calm down and to prepare that, okay, I know these are my strengths, these are my weaknesses. What am I going to do to fix my weaknesses, or at least have a plan to articulate this clearly during the interview or during a conversation with my boss, whether you're doing performance reviews, updates, and stuff like that, asking for support on how we can do better. And as for the strengths, then again, learning how to communicate that, that it can be understood by your boss, stakeholders, clients, hiring managers, HR recruiters, and so forth. So I know it sounds very conceptual, but really, really, it comes down to just the two categories. I want you to honestly ask yourself how much of it is you

actually hoping that any challenge that comes like it's like a surprise right and the way that i like to think about it it's not that you know we want to be planning every single part of our career journey obviously it is impossible but the point i'm trying to make here is that how much are you just hoping and then reacting and most of the time negatively reacting because you're already in a panic mode when something happens right so it's kind of like in a situation where you're suddenly confronted with something you don't really know what to do and then naturally you're gonna panic and whenever you panic you don't have clarity you don't have confidence and obviously you know the outcome is not going to turn out well as compared to someone who is focused

on knowing it's like okay i know that these, okay, I know that these are my strengths. I know that these are my weaknesses. I know these are the situations with my boss, stakeholder, client, you know, performance reviewer or whatever, that I don't feel the most comfortable. I don't feel the most confident. Okay, let me note that down.

And then let me actually take some actions to improve my knowledge. Now, I say knowledge and not confidence because confidence is actually an outcome because confidence is a feeling. So if you don't know what you're doing, of course, you're not going to feel good about it, right? But if you know what you're supposed to be doing

or at least have a rough idea of like, okay, this is the next step that I'm going to take, then you definitely feel naturally more confident because you're like, okay, you know, at least this is something that I can try. This is actually the next step that I can take. And this is something that would make sense for any progress updates that you do like, okay, you know, I, at least it's something that I can try. This is actually the next step that I can take. And this is something that would make sense for any progress updates that you do with your boss, right? Any conversations that you have in your workplace,

or even any interviews with Nohesha hiring managers and recruiters as well. Knowing the next thing to respond, because you have done your preparation, you have, you know, gathered certain details, you have prepared. It's basically, you know, like the point I'm trying to make here is that, you know, what's the next thing to do, right? So this will actually make any challenging situation not turn into an actual challenge. It's just, okay, it's just something I need to take action on. So I think that's a much better mindset whereby naturally you'll be focused more on taking baby steps, taking small actions versus worrying and falling down into the feelings. And therefore, you know, I've not met a single person whereby a person who worries all the time suddenly feels confident about themselves, right?

Most of the time it doesn't happen, right? The real confidence comes from knowing that, okay, I know what to do next. This is something that I can expect. So I go in with an open mind and i'm just going to tackle and deal with whatever that comes along step by step step by step and this is actually something that i tackle and i discuss and work with my corporate survivor members so corporate survivor if you don't know it's actually my career program for nine to five professionals and every single month we have a monthly mentoring session and what happens during this session is that

members will submit their current career or workplace challenges. And a lot of times it's very similar to the question that we discussed today. How can I develop more confidence? This is exactly the thing that happened. And is there something that I'm missing? Maybe can you give me some guidance, some perspectives? So as I said, right, understanding the core concept, the core fundamentals, the core fundamentals, the root cause of why certain things are happening. I think it kind of gives you more perspectives and insights like, hey, actually this is happening and what am I doing to cycle myself

to make it sound even worse for me? Or maybe there are just a few things that I can do to then prepare, right? To take action, to try to fix my career situation, to try to fix my work situation. And let me tell you that it's really not as bad as it sounds. But the only thing that will drag you down is to continue telling yourself that I have low confidence, low confidence, low confidence.

It's like, okay, if you keep telling yourself that every single day, then how is it going to get better? It is not going to get better, right? Because everything that you focus on is going to become bigger. So a small, you know, lack of confidence issue, which could just be resolved by maybe learning how to better structure interview answers, right? Learning how to prepare for your performance reviews. And all of this, I actually taught in the Corporate Survivor program itself, right? You can just take,

instead of like worrying for that 30 minutes, you can just take 30 minutes to watch the lesson and like learn, okay, this is actually what I can expect. This is how I can prepare. And then poof, you know, you'd feel so much more confident because you're no longer hoping. You are now knowing that this is within my control. Okay, this is what I can expect. And then I'm going to focus on taking these actions at least in the next couple of days or in the next couple of weeks. And this allows you to continue to focus on the small wins, the small steps. And this is really the most important thing. Confidence doesn't happen overnight. But at the same time, if you really, really want to develop real work confidence, real career confidence, it is actually learning how to trust in yourself. And how do you

learn how to trust in yourself? As I said, it's transitioning from hoping into knowing. And how do you learn? It's like, how do you know something? It's like you learn the lessons, you gain the perspectives, you gain the insights, and then you are going to be able to navigate any career situation. And when you feel that you can deal with any challenges, you don't need to panic when something happens, then naturally you're going to develop the feeling of confidence.

You're going to start feeling confident. And I'll wrap up with the thing that I to develop the feeling of confidence. You're going to start feeling confident. And I'll wrap up with the thing that I said at the beginning of today's episode is that confidence is actually the outcome, right? Confidence is the outcome. So what is going to lead to confidence is taking baby steps, is gaining perspectives, understand the fundamentals, right? Learning about root cause. Okay, why is this happening?

Okay, what's the knowledge that I'm lacking? What's the skill that I'm lacking? And then putting in effort to enhance those skills. I'm telling you, it's going to go a very, very long way. If you really want to have a very confident, calm, and feeling like in control career that is like very happy, work-life balance, super chill, and stuff like that, then you really, really need to master how to build real inner confidence. And that is about learning how to transition from the feelings of hoping into knowing. So let me know if you're watching on YouTube and comment below, are you in the hoping category or are you in the knowing category? And if you're listening on Spotify or Apple or any podcasting platforms, make sure that you follow the podcast so that you don't miss out on any

future episodes. And I'm going to tell you that over the next couple of days, we're going to have back-to-back episodes on me answering your burning questions on your career, workplace, as well as job search. So make sure that you subscribe, follow the podcast, and I'll see you in the next episode. Bye!