Preconceived ideas.
Entry posted by Azores Hi
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It’s funny how our expectations cloud our judgements isn’t it?
For example:
Person A works has a leading role in a small company but he doesn’t believe in his own abilities as a manager. As a consequence whenever he is praised for his work he quickly dismisses it and it’s quickly forgotten. Perversely, whenever he is criticised he will dwell on what has happened and torture himself, wondering what went wrong and agonising about how to put things right.
He goes home to his wife and tells her all about the mistake he has made, when he goes to the pub with his mate he will have the same conversation.
In short what is happening is that he is focusing on the bad stuff and not allowing himself to feel the praise and celebrate it.
The irony is that in his conversations with his mates he complains that he never gets recognition for the hard work he puts in and the long hours he works. He is getting it but he doesn’t listen to that bit!
He does this because of the image he has of himself. He doubts his own abilities and so is always looking for the evidence to support his theory, after all, no one wants to be proved wrong do they?
He is looking at the small blemish on an otherwise perfectly white sheet of paper.
Person B is the manager of person A.
She sees great potential in person A, their skills are a bit rough around the edges but the potential is there for person A to be a great manager and to make a real success of their role. Person B has been coaching person A for a while, trying to raise him up to a higher standard. The only trouble is that every time person A fails she senses that he falls back down to a lower level again. It really knocks his confidence and he ends up back where he started.
It’s got to the point now where person B is losing patience. It seems like a predictable pattern. Person A takes a few steps forward and then takes a few steps back again. Now Person B has come to expect it. She has now got preconceived ideas about person B and finds herself becoming frustrated with his performance and she is now becoming overly critical, picking on the slightest mistake, he seems to require constant support and positive feedback, but in reality she hasn’t got time to nurture person A full time, and he doesn’t listen anyway!
She is looking for the slightest blemish on an otherwise perfectly white sheet of paper.
So what is the answer? Some of us are very pessimistic. We are constantly looking for praise from others, but if we don’t have faith in ourselves we don’t take this praise on board anyway. The answer is to change our own image of ourselves, if you truly believe that you can be successful then you will start to act successful. Take on board people’s criticism, but don’t dwell on it. Learn from it and move on, confident in the knowledge that you have grown stronger and you won’t repeat the mistake.
When you start to act successful then people will recognise that trait in you. Their preconceived idea of you will be that you are a winner. When it comes to that new promotion or that important contract they need to get, who do you think will be at the top of the list of candidates?
P.s. I worked out all this during the third pint in the pub last night! By the forth the conversation had moved on to house prices! But I thought I had better get this little gem of wisdom down today before I forgot. I’m sure it’s not a new revelation but it’s taken me 32 years to figure it out. I hope you find it useful too...?
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