Amongst most of us, the occupation and the definition of success may vary but there is one thing which is common i.e. a desire to be successful. Thereafter, the question is, “are we all able to translate this desire into a reality?”
During my professional career, I have interviewed and hired hundreds of professionals. Based on my personal experience, the success of an employee is due to combination of behaviour competencies and the job competencies. And behaviour competencies are what we find difficult to assess in a potential employee e.g. whether person can cope with the rejections in a potential sales career or not, we may not be able to assess accurately. In fact, the person himself may not know until he gets into the job and goes through the reality of it. For employer, it is very difficult to change the behaviour of employees the way they want it to change. However, for some of the employees, the required behaviour is natural and they succeed with very little help.
With a wishful thinking, instead of varied behaviour competencies, we tried to search for one core behaviour which is required for someone to translate the desire of success to a reality regardless of the job or occupation.
After going through numerous trials over the years, we have come to the conclusion about that one core behaviour which is needed in a person to be a winner/successful person i.e. besides desire, people who have developed beliefs in themselves are invariably successful in translating the desire into the reality. It is really up to you and you alone.
If you do not believe in yourself, if you do not believe that you deserve to be successful and if you do not believe that you have what it takes to create a successful life what you deserve then you will remain where you are right now.
And the next step is, if anyone is lacking in this required core behaviour, how one can cultivate this core behaviour in him/her to unlock the path of success. I am delighted to share some of our findings with the hope that you can learn how one can develop this core behaviour through good habits, at any stage of your life.
You may react to this and say this sounds too easy, too simplistic. You can start believing in yourself from today onwards without much difficulty. Yes indeed, it is too easy for a few. However, for many, the reality is that it requires self-realisation and the commitment for a step-by-step process to achieve it because you are supposed to believe in yourself when in reality, you do not believe in yourself!
I am going to share the overview of the process which we have for professionals to develop the beliefs in themselves. The process starts with making a fresh start regardless of your age or experience. You have to make a few clear choices; sacrifice and make a room for what you want; and allow yourself to be successful.
- Starting Point: You have a unique talent and you have a unique way of expressing it. Be honest to discover your uniqueness with an open mind, what you have achieved so far against what your goals or dreams are; give credit to yourself for what you have achieved; what challenges you have faced thus far and what you have learnt from it. Stop blaming yourself or others or your circumstances or what others think about you. Take full responsibility of who you are, how different you are and where you are now. This shall give you the courage to accept your uniqueness and therefore, shall help you to start believing in your potential.
- Choice of your Vision/Dreams: Every occupation is meaningful because it adds value to someone. And, every occupation can make you successful. Therefore, the most important criteria for you to choose the occupation or career are to find out (a) what interests you or what you love to do or a dream or a vision or a purpose in life which keeps you awake (b) what you want to be good at and (c) what world needs. Pride for an occupation or career comes from within. You have to make a choice and be willing to make sacrifices in prioritising this choice for yourself. Once you have made the choice, you shall be able to move forward with the least efforts. When you are engaged in work which you love, you can work for unbelievably long hours without feeling exhausted.
- Find a Mentor: None of us is perfect and we need someone we can talk to about our dreams, doubts, challenges, solutions, second opinion perhaps and validation of what we have been doing. Regardless of age, one always needs a mentor at some point of time or another, whom one can talk to. Avoid making your friends or peers as your mentors unless they have the pre-requisites. Mentor must be someone who is committed, has capacity and wisdom to guide you without any vested interests. If possible, get the validation of what and why your choice of vision/dream is.
- Develop positive Attitude and Integrity: Someone had to believe that reaching the moon is possible, only then one could reach the moon. Someone did and therefore many had since then been to the moon and now someone is making a business out of the space tourism. Having a positive attitude shall give you courage to overcome the obstacles and shall help you in believing in yourself. It is very important for you to be motivated and positive attitude shall ensure that you are continuously motivated. Positive attitude shall create a sense of confidence in you which shall not need any reassurance form others. Do remember a golden rule – you fail only when you stop trying. Every failure brings you a step closer to success.
You MUST hold high standards of integrity because it shall keep your beliefs protected all the times. Stay with the right and not the convenient if you want to play the game of success for life.
- Set Goals & have Plans: As per a study conducted on students of Harvard Business School, the students who had goals & plans, after 10 years they were earning on average, ten times as much as other students put together who did not have goals. You must set goals for yourself, write it down & have plans to achieve it. When you start achieving the milestones of your goals, your self confidence and reinforcement of your beliefs will set in within you. These goals shall also drive your behaviour every day with the positive energy and motivation.
- Create a muscle called Discipline: Once you have set goals for yourself, only way to achieve it is to have a disciplined approach. Without discipline, one can never achieve the great heights in any field whether it is in the areas of sports or business or corporate world. Please take this as a golden rule. You must have discipline for what you are trying to achieve and rest shall start falling in place.
- Believe in Results: Every action has consequence of that action. If you are adding higher value to your customers, they shall give you more business in return; if you are delivering the results at your work, more rewards you shall get from your manager/employer etc. Do believe in results. More results you generate for others, more value you shall receive in return and more confidence you shall gain. And as you receive more, your ability to generate more results will also increase.
- Conquer the fear of success: Recognising fear of failure is one reason why many do not pursue the goals. With the above process, most shall overcome the fear of failure. However, much harder to recognise is the fear of success because it is a consequence of success itself and some of you may fear to take more responsibility to go beyond your current success. You may fear what others may think about you. This is the time for you to reassess your dream/vision, your financial security & humility. This shall help you create the required confidence in believing in yourself once again & therefore to keep moving forward to greater success.
Jit Nagpal-Founder CEO of Sciente Consulting Pte Ltd (79th fastest growing technology company in Asia Pacific by Deloitte Technology Fast500 Asia Pacific 2011) and Sciente International Pte Ltd (a specialist IT Talent search & recruitment firm).