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Tag: Challenges

Famous People Get Nervous Too

According to this BBC Report, Robbie Williams has problems with his confidence. For most people, this will be totally dismissed as nonesense because it doesn’t make sense that someone with confidence issues could sing live in front of thousands or even millions of people. However the truth is that everyone experiences confidence challenges, however there are some people who have learned to get through it.

There is no need to make comparisons between ourselves and famous people like Robbie Williams, our own experience of confidence is our own. No-one is likely to ask you to sing in front of thousands of people, and if they did you’d have to get through it somehow, or run for the hills.

The bottom line is it’s ok to have issues with your confidence. There are some people in life who push themselves to overcome their fears to see how well they can master their self-confidence. Again, this is not something that you are likely to choose for yourself. What we can learn from these people who do it anyway, in spite of their fears and lack of confidence, is that we can overcome these things for ourselves. For you it might be that speaking up in a meeting fills you with fear and dread, or it might be doing some public speaking, or as simple as speaking with a difficult boss.

We are all capable of overcoming our fears and finding our inner confidence. Sometimes it can be as simple as giving yourself a push in the right direction – so if you are asked to do a presentation, accept before you think to say no! Once you’ve got through it, of course you are going to review your performance – don’t forget the things you did right! For one, you got up there and you did it – which is unlike your normal self. Learn to focus only on the good points – ok it’s hard, but it’s better than beating yourself up!

If you ask someone who appears to have good confidence, “What areas do you feel you struggle with your confidence”, there won’t be many people who answer, “None”. From my own experience of coaching un-confident people and those who attend my workshops, I find that the vast majority of them appear to be confident already. It’s about how you feel, and realising that you are not the only one… it happens to everyone.

Take a leaf out of Robbie’s book and just do it.

Infuriating Customer Service

I’ve recently (well for a few months now) received some really poor customer service from a well known rentals by post company in the UK. I’m not going to go into the details here, nor am I going to name and shame – it’s not my style. I see this as an opportunity to learn some really important points.

The main challenge I’m having, and I believe this is true of almost all poor customer service, is that I’m really struggling to be understood. This particular company prefer to do everything by email and I have sent in the region of 15 emails about their service in the last 6 months. To their credit, each time I have contacted them, they have replied within a few hours, however they seem to have a set of stock responses that do not relate to the challenges I’ve experienced.

In any situation where a customer or client makes a complaint, it is critical that your customer services representatives get straight to the root of the problem, without making assumptions about what their customer is experiencing. In the IT world, (where I worked before becoming a coach) the help-desks would always ask the obvious questions such as, “is it switched on at the wall” and “have you tried rebooting the computer”. I’m sure if you’ve had those conversations with an IT help-desk, you’ll have some idea of how frustrating it is.

I’m happy to allow one of these stock responses – I can understand that help centres must receive a good proportion of complaints where the user is doing something wrong. However, when a company continues answering your enquiries with these stock responses, it becomes immensely irritating. Rather like having a conversation with someone who is clearly only interested in hearing themselves speak. It feels like you are banging your head against a brick wall and there seems to be no solution. If you allow your customers to get to this point, you are pretty much guaranteed to have lost them for good.

One of the major problems that large companies have chosen to take on, is when they outsource their help and customer relations to a country where their staff speak the customers language only as a second language. Immediately, in such difficult communications, you are creating a barrier. If your customer or client feels like they are not being heard or understood (which sadly is often the case) they immediately feel that you are a company who do not care and all trust is lost. Many complaints are complicated in their nature and even if the user is in error, the customer service staff must first understand their point of view before explaining the correct procedure or pointing out what they may do differently.

The bottom line is that you don’t get many chances to make a good impression – especially in an economic climate that people feel uncomfortable in. The most upset and angry of customers can easily be turned into a trusting, loyal customer with a little understanding from someone who represents your company. It strikes me that when you receive poor customer service, you immediately assume that the company doesn’t care about it’s customers. The truth is probably that they are doing things on the cheap and paying the price for that in their customer service.

There is no situation that cannot be resolved in an agreeable way – with good customer service, where the client feels heard and understood, you are 95% of the way there.

A Lot On Your Mind?

Lately I’ve had a lot on my mind and it’s amazing how this can seem to get in your way. Luckily for me I know how I can deal with the thoughts and feelings and if I begin to feel overwhelmed, I can relax and switch off. For me this usually lends a new perspective and I’m then eager to get back on with things.

For me, it is often the apparent sheer volume of items on my to-do list coupled with some imminent deadlines that triggers this kind of situation. I know the consequences of ploughing on and not taking a step back and I know the benefits of doing so.

Most often, a quick 10 minutes of re-evaluating and prioritising does the trick and is well worth the time spent. The other times, usually I find it best to be honest with myself and deal with the possible issues before they arrive – e.g. Letting any affected parties know that I will not be finished on time.

Of course in an ideal world, our lists of tasks are completed on time and we do not become overwhelmed… However in the real world, to me the best course of action is to deal with the challenges as they become apparent. Most often they can be overcome and deadlines can be shifted before they are missed. This is self-responsibility.

Time Out

Taking some time for yourself is one of the most important things in this busy world that we live in. There always seems to be something to do and to just switch off creates major challenges for so many of us. Most people are aware of the consequences of not taking time out and yet so few people do so with any regularity.

Better than simply taking time out is taking time out with no distraction or other tasks to do. In fact, making the time out the task is many people’s solution. If the only important thing you have to do is to spend time on your own doing your own choice of thing, then the quality and effectiveness of the time out is hugely increased.

Really it is impossible to take time out when you are thinking about things that you have to do, or places you have to be, or worrying about aspects of your life. In fact that kind of time out is likely to create more stress and worry that you are not doing all those other things.

Time out is a discipline – just like time management (which of course enables time out to be included in our schedule) or organisation skills. It takes hard work and commitment, but the benefits are extremely powerful and enhance our ability to focus and be effective in our work, our relationships, our hobbies and all other aspects of our lives.

So, think of the things you would do if you had no tasks left to do and no other commitments for your time. Then schedule these things into your schedule on a regular basis and go and do them.

Making Judgments

It seems to be part of our nature that we make judgments. We do it unconsciously and all of the time.

From our very first few thoughts we are trying to make sense of the world around us. Our brain has a compulsion to understand everything that we see, hear, feel, smell or taste. This, of course, is how we learn.

One of the challenges facing an Executive or Life Coach is being able to be totally impartial and non-judgmental. This is also something that is very useful in all walks of life and can often make the difference between greatness and normality.

When someone or something presents you with a situation that defies some of your core beliefs, this is a near impossible task. Your brain must support your beliefs, that is its job, hence you are likely to react with a strong emotional response.

One of the most effective ways to remain in a place of non-judgment, is to simply remember that this person or situation is not part of your experience. It certainly is not in your realm of responsibiliy.

You can, of course, try to change them or the situation, but how likely is that? From the point of view of a coach, this is overstepping your role and responsibility, and it undermines your ability to facilitate change.

So when someone does or says somehing that you choose to react to with judgment, remember that this person is creating their experience, just as you are creating yours, and has chosen their own actions. If you can offer them support with this understanding, you are well placed to help them to help themselves.

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