Despite what you might think, not all high-flying executives have their sh*t together.

Picture a high-flying executive. Someone that holds a senior position in an organisation. We may have a similar picture, someone who is sharp, bright, in control, inspiring, exudes confidence etc. Generally, someone who is ‘on their game’, right?

The truth is appearances can be deceptive. In my 15 years as a Executive Coach, I’ve worked with a huge number of highly successful senior executive who suffer with crippling self-doubt, low self-esteem and confidence.

I’m not alone, my colleague Jeremy Glyn (creator of the ABC of Success model and author of The Inside Track) conducted a survey amongst a large group of Managing Directors who had attended his workshops and was astonished that developing their self-esteem and confidence was by far the most important concept covered.

Why is this?

I think Jeremy sums this up really well in his book: “The MD’s self-esteem was fragile because their prominent roles and responsibilities added extra pressure on them, they felt unable to share concerns or problems in their business with others, they were constantly confronted by challenges they were expected to sort out, and they seldom received any thanks or praise for their hard work.”

So what’s the solution; how can people raise their self-esteem and confidence?

There are a number of techniques, all of which are covered, in detail, in our Power Thinking workshop. In short, 

• You need to turn the negative thinking off and turn positive thinking on. Start by identifying the self-talk that is not serving you and cut it off. Then start to develop self-talk that does support you.

• Affirmations can be an excellent tool for making changes to limiting elements such as unhelpful beliefs and unrealistic expectations.  

• Another excellent tool is to form a picture of your best self – as a super confident, resilent person. Describe how ‘you would walk, how you would talk, how you would be’. Then run over this image in your mind frequently – visualise your best self.

If you’d like support with building your self-esteem and confidence, we’re here to help. And if your team or organisation, as whole, could do with a boost and improvement in performance, the Power Thinking workshop is what you need.