Confidence Is NOT Competence
Probably my geekiest post yet - this is a long-ish read, but covers a very important topic:
Competence VS Confidence, and why they're NOT the same (and why that distinction matters).
Also, why I keep banging on about how (good) public speaking is a damn skill - and why technique and practice are more important than other, more popular things (cough - ‘mindset’ - cough)😉
If you're interested in this topic, grab a cup of something and follow me down the rabbit hole.
…
A lovely client sent me something a while ago.
It’s a VERY interesting study, that backs up what I’m always banging on about:
✨ TECHNIQUE! SKILL! ✨
It was a study done in the Netherlands: they took socially anxious people, and divided them into two groups.
👉 Group A was given skills training - focused on doing stuff, more structured.
👉 Group B was given ‘inner’ training - mindset and thinking about how they see themselves.
Guess which one showed FAR more improvement during the same time frame (two weeks, and then another check at three months)?
Yep - if you’ve been following me for a while, you guessed it.
💪 Group A had an 80% success rate, whereas Group B only a 44%.
They measured things like
how much tension they experienced in social situations,
how often they engaged in social situations
what social skills they possessed (eg. public speaking, diffusing embarrassing situations, handling difficult requests)
(Personal Note: I’d even bet that if the study had continued longer and they’d checked in after 6 months, Group B would have dropped further. Because largely what that ‘inner’ stuff gives you, is some transient confidence. Ultimately you need some COMPETENCE and SKILLS to solidify that confidence.
If you try speaking to an audience and they’re barely paying attention, there’s only so far confidence will get you - both in terms of impact, and of...you know, not feeling 💩 about yourself afterwards.)
Now, I know: public speaking isn’t the same as social anxiety. You can be a great speaker who still gets anxious, and a crap one that doesn’t.
But there is significant overlap: they both involve how you
* interact
* communicate, and
* connect with others.
They are both strongly affected by your ability to come across well, and impact people the way you need to (as opposed to them writing some story about you in their head).
This is a recent study, so not a huge amount of data yet - but it corroborates everything else I’ve seen on this topic:
At drama school, there were no ‘inner’ modules. We never sat down to cry about our limiting beliefs or fears. There was never an ‘OK, today we’ll all be really confident’ lesson, either. We just learned some technical, tangible communication and storytelling skills. And that helped us connect to an audience - and yes, to overcome or at least limit our stage fright.
I don’t do ANY ‘inner’ work with my clients. There’s no Mindset module in my 1:1 course. There are no long discussions on feelings in my workshops. We just take action and get great, and unusually FAST results - check out what people say after working with me. No inner fluff, all action.
So, despite the ever-so-popular belief that miiiiindset is the alpha and the omega of good public speaking, performance, communication...It isn’t.
With one caveat:
✔ If you want to speak in front of an audience JUST SO you can say you did it (like, it’s on your bucket list, between ‘wrestle a crocodile’ and ‘bake a croquembouche’) - by all means, go do it. And feel proud that you faced that fear.
❌ But if you need to do it to help your business grow and build clout...I’m sorry, but you’ll have to do it WELL. Not just confidently. Because the audience isn’t there for you; they care about what you can offer them - not how you felt doing it.
The link to the study is below - if your Dutch (or German) isn’t that good, you can put it through Google Translate and get most of it.
Link: https://www.schoolvoortraining.nl/van-binnen-naar-buiten-trainen-of-andersom-2/
PS: If you need help communicating competently with your audience (social media videos, podcast interviews, presentations, keynote speeches) - hit me up. A trained actor’s beady eye and feedback might just be what you need to improve quickly. The contact link is at the bottom of the page.