How To Uplevel Your Confidence

Do women experience a confidence gap in terms of success?

This one question sent me on a mission to understand the importance of belief in self while influencing and leading others.

• Women desire to take bigger risks yet make decisions within their comfort zone.

• Women say they want more yet continue to invest in fear. 

• Women long for larger platforms and higher visibility but ask too small because they fear rejection.

Yes! We can suffer from a lack of confidence at all levels of leadership and at different times in our engineering career.

Personally, I call it the belief gap - an inability to believe we deserve better while knowing we want more. If we don’t work on our “inside game” or uplevel our confidence, the result could be no seat at the table, smaller profits, unfulfilled purpose, and a team with untapped potential under poor leadership.

A few years ago, I sat down to speak with Karlyn D. Henderson, CEO of Poimena Consulting based in Atlanta, GA. Karlyn consults with leaders who find it challenging to own their power and use their command presence like an executive to lead a successful, profitable team.  We spent over an hour discussing women in leadership, confidence, and how to be a better leader.

This interview is still relevant today.

Eryka: What is power?

Karlyn: Power is the ability to lead and influence others to accomplish a goal or a task.

Eryka: When talking about power and ensuring we stand in our power, does that also equate to confidence? Are they the same or different?

Karlyn: Confidence and power are cousins but they are not the same things. They are not interchangeable. Confidence is the ability for a leader to believe in their own ability to accomplish a goal. And, power is the influence of others to accomplish that goal or task as well. First, you must have the confidence that you can do, lead, and achieve. Then, influence is to have others help you to achieve.

Eryka: What has been your personal struggle around power and confidence?

Karlyn: That’s an excellent question. And, I must be transparent in order for people to know they are not the only ones because that was a personal struggle for me…’am I the only person struggling with a lack of confidence?’

Eryka: No.

Karlyn:  Right! Once I started talking to other women, I understood I was not alone.  But, my personal struggle stems around I felt like I was not good enough and did not have enough ability. Unfortunately, I was surrounded by leaders who did not believe in me and they were holding me back. Once you are told you can’t do anything and you can only go so far whether it’s from leaders, parents, or teachers that can be a mindset struggle moving forward. So that was my struggle and I did not have enough credibility of my own to believe in myself. And, so many women are like that where they feel like I don’t deserve this or who am I to be great and marvelous or who am I to accomplish great things. This is a mindset that women need to learn how to overcome.

Do you want to be a better leader? Confidence is your ticket and I’m committed to helping you get there. Success is intentional. 

Are you ready to uplevel your confidence?

Eryka