Do you convince yourself you’ll lose or convince yourself you’ll win?

Work Smart Not Hard Tip No. 41 in a series written for Indie Cambs

If you know me, you’ll now that I’m a bit of a tennis fan. The gladiatorial aspect of the sport is fascinating.  It truly is a game where no-one can predict the outcome until the last point is played and the score board does not reflect the effort that went into winning those points.

Someone who is consistently losing every point and looks as though they have no hope of winning can turn things around and point by point claw their way back to a winning position.

A presentation by Dan Pink (author of DRIVE, the book I named my network for) explains that there are parallels between how effective we are in business that stems from how we deal with failure.

It boils down to how buoyant we are and how we approach a situation.

Buoyancy is the sweet spot between levity and gravity. Optimists are not so blind that we’re in la-la-land refusing to see any problems but not so weighed down that we expect to fail.

The best predictor of success, not just in business but in life, is how you explain failure. If you respond to losing by saying, “This always happens”, “It’s all my fault”, “I’m useless”, this attitude makes it hard to keep trying.

People who are buoyant, who are able to keep going and try again,  explain failure as:

Temporary – “I was a bit flat”
Specific – “It was the wrong solution for the problem.”
External – “The conditions were really challenging”

Pink suggests the answer is to practice defensive pessimism.

Rehearse the worst case scenario before an encounter and it helps to de-catastrophise it and increases buoyancy. Ask “What’s the worst that can happen?” and you’ll most likely discover it’s something you can cope with and needn’t be afraid of.

I firmly believe that confidence helps us in every encounter, whatever our role in life or in business, so if you want to talk about how you can get better at being more optimistic and buoyant, get in touch and we’ll have a chat!