A few months back I reached out to a few ladies in my girl gang, and asked them to share with me some of the key professional and career questions that they would love answers to. Challenges that they face in their jobs or careers that they weren’t sure how to navigate. Areas that they didn’t feel confident in.
Do you want to know what most of the feedback had in common? It came from a place of not knowing, or not feeling, confident enough to sell themselves and the unique value they bring to their organisations. Ultimately not knowing HOW to sell themselves with confidence, whether that be to themselves (e.g truly believing in their own worth!), in person, online, in a meeting and everything in between!
Being able to sell yourself with confidence is critical for your current and future career success. It is fundamental to every new career challenge you take on, new project you are a part of, and every promotion, or new job opportunity you want the chance to put yourself forward for.
Yet, for many of us, we don’t know where to start. Or, we don’t want to seem like we are ‘tooting our own horn’, bragging, or selling ourselves too much.
Well…….. I hate to break it to you, but you no longer have a choice, my friend.
If you want to continue to grow, develop and stretch yourself in your career, you NEED to be able to sell yourself with confidence. NO ONE else will do it for you.
My observation is that the opportunity to get better at selling ourselves lies across four major areas that are all inextricably linked to each other;
- Selling ourselves to Ourselves – Actually knowing who we are, what we’ve achieved, and the unique value, experiences and skillsets that we do actually bring.
- Selling ourselves Online - Being able to articulate those achievements, our unique skillsets, the value that we add to our organisations, and present them in such a way online (Note: I include your resume in this also), that recruiters simply cannot resist. Your online brand. Your online presence. This is critical to how you show up to the outside world.
- Selling ourselves in Person – Being able to rock up to an interview, or a networking event and feel genuinely confident to talk to someone face to face (or virtually) about who you are, what you do, what you are great at, and what value you add to your organisation (some of you are probably sweating just at the thought of that conversation right now!). This also includes being able to negotiate confidently on things like salary, perks and benefits, or training and development opportunities.
- Selling ourselves so that people STOP and LISTEN - This is a HUGE one that I see play out so often in the workplace. We are not confident enough to put our ideas on the table. To speak up. To share a thought or an opinion, and so often we undermine ourselves with our own use of language. We “Ummm” and “Ahhh”, or say things like “I’m probably wrong about this, but…..” – see my recent article about how the language we can use can undermine us HERE. We discount the value and the unique viewpoint and experiences that we bring to the table, and we make the assumption that everyone else around us is smarter, more experienced, more senior, and therefore has the right to more airtime than we do. So, we lean back. We play small. We don’t share. And when we don’t share, my friend, we aren’t seen. And when we aren’t seen, we often miss out on opportunities. Career growth. Promotions. Salary increases. Development opportunities.
So, do you see my point here? Being able to sell ourselves with confidence, and truly talk to the value that we bring, and BELIEVE it ourselves, is absolutely fundamental if we want to continue to grow and take on opportunities in our careers.
I watched a TED Talk a little while back by Casey Brown which was called “Know your worth and then ask for it” – you can watch it here. It was a fantastic TED Talk and well worth the 8 minutes, but one thing really stood out to me and it was this…
“No one will ever give you what you are worth. They will give you what they think you are worth. YOU are the one who controls their thinking.”
Our ability to confidently articulate our worth is critical to us receiving it in whatever form that looks like to us - be it salary, promotions, title changes, training, working flexibility etc.
My wish for you is that if someone asked you right now the following question that you would be able to answer it easily, concisely and with confidence that stems from deep within.
“Who are you, and what unique value do you believe that you add?”
How did you go with your answer? Did you nail it, or fumble through?
If you struggled with it, that is ok. This is your starting point. Your opportunity to improve and gain greater strength in your own confidence and belief in who you are and what you have achieved.
If you know that selling yourself with confidence is an issue you been battling for a while. If you know that it is costing you job opportunities, promotions, and probably even pay increases, then perhaps it is time you got out of your own way.
Our transformational coaching program “Sell yourself with Confidence” is guaranteed to have you walking away with the following things in your newly found toolkit:
- The confidence to articulate your unique story and your own worth – you’ll be able to state clearly and with confidence the value you bring!
- You’ll be clear on your strengths and have confidence in your own unique story and your own voice.
- You’ll have greater clarity on how your own personal experiences have shaped you and the skillset they’ve provided you with. Better yet, how those unique experiences translate into the work environment and can help you in your career.
- You’ll finally have stopped the need to compare your life to others, because you’ll have comfort in your own success.
- You’ll have a rock-solid resume that screams “hire me!”.
- You’ll have a LinkedIn profile that recruiters will be unable to resist.
- When you are contacted by recruiters, you’ll finally feel confident enough to answer their questions on the spot without worrying that you’ve said the wrong thing, and then overthinking all of your answers when you hang up the phone!
- You’ll be confident enough to state your salary expectations boldly, and without panicking and then downplaying the amount.
- You’ll be able to speak up with confidence at meetings and know that your experience and your opinion are worthy.
- You'll have a network map and a game plan to ensure you are visible at work, and the first in mind when opportunities do come to life.
You have two choices now.
Join our waitlist to be alerted when the group program of 'Sell yourself with Confidence' opens up for applications. OR, get on top of this NOW and take charge of your own career success via our private version of the 'Sell yourself with Confidence' Program. I only take on a few private clients for this program to ensure everyone gets the uniquely tailored support they need. Connect with me here and find our how you can apply for the private program.
Don’t waste another year waiting, wishing and hoping that someone will notice your worth at work – go out and make sure that they do!