A Review On Self-Confidence and How to Improve It

Abstract

Self confidence is one of the most important traits a person can possess, and it is something we all strive to achieve. In fact, if you ask anyone who has achieved great success in their life what they think are the key ingredients to being successful, they will tell you “Self-confidence”. There are many different types of self confidence but here I am going to focus on the kind that comes from within yourself as opposed to the kind that comes from outside sources like others’ opinions or even your own past experiences.

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Global Journal of Human Resource Management
Vol.10, No.5, pp.26-32, 2022
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Online ISSN: 2053-5694(Online)
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A Review on Self-Confidence and How to Improve It
Houssem Eddine Ben Messaoud
Houssem.ben.messaoud@gmail.com
Swiss School of Business and Management, Geneva, Switzerland
Citation: Houssem Eddine Ben Messaoud (2022) A Review on Self-Confidence and How to Improve It,
Global Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol.10, No.5, pp.26-32
ABSTRACT: Self confidence is one of the most important traits a person can possess,
and it is something we all strive to achieve. In fact, if you ask anyone who has achieved
great success in their life what they think are the key ingredients to being successful,
they will tell you “Self-confidence”. There are many different types of self confidence
but here I am going to focus on the kind that comes from within yourself as opposed to
the kind that comes from outside sources like others’ opinions or even your own past
experiences.
KEY WORDS: Personality, confidence, self-confidence, attitude, goals
INTRODUCTION
Self confidence is the ability to believe in yourself and your abilities. It also means that
you can accept your mistakes, failures, and shortcomings without being afraid of them.
Self confidence enables you to take risks and try new things, which leads to success.
It’s a feeling of security about yourself or your abilities as well as an acceptance of
negative feelings such as fear, anxiety or insecurity towards certain situations or people.
It can be developed by doing activities that make you feel good about yourself like
exercising, reading books with positive messages etc. You should develop a positive
attitude towards life.
People sometimes confuse confidence with arrogance. The arrogant person is usually
actually an insecure person, and their arrogance is a way to hide their insecurities.
Where an arrogant person is boastful, a confident person has no need to boast - they
know that their achievements speak for themselves. Where an arrogant person will have
trouble admitting they were wrong, a confident person is perfectly willing to admit
when they are wrong - they know that the admission doesn’t diminish their value or
their abilities. If an arrogant person tends to focus on looking good or appearing to be
the best, a confident person focuses on being the best and doing the best.
Self esteem is the way you feel about yourself. It’s how you see yourself and what you
think of your abilities, skills, and talents. Self esteem can be developed through positive
experiences in life, such as being praised by others or receiving compliments from
family members. It can also be developed through good habits like exercising regularly
or eating healthy foods.

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Low self-esteem is a feeling of worthlessness and lack of confidence. It may be caused
by past experiences; such as being bullied or rejected by others. Low self-esteem can
also stem from problems in the present: you may have low self-esteem because you’re
struggling to cope with an illness, for example, or because you’ve recently been through
a divorce.
At times, we need to gain self-belief at work, when we report for an interview, or even
when we want to face our bosses for a salary review. If you really want self-confidence,
then there are various tips that can boost it and ensure you believe in your capabilities.
REVIEW ON IPS TO IMPROVE SELF-CONFIDENCE
Dress up
The first tip you can always turn to is proper dressing where you should pay attention
to your outfit so you can carry yourself confidently. It will also be easier when
interacting with others since you will not have to worry about your looks or how you
smell. In this regard, you would not need new clothes or a complete makeover of your
wardrobe to look presentable.
Step up the pace
The next tip is stepping up the pace. In this case, one should watch how their colleagues
are walking and what the walking style might portend or communicate. One of the
questions to ask is, ‘Do they walk slowly or quickly while their heads are up or down?
or ‘Do they have a smile on their faces? These pointers will help improve one’s
confidence and flow your energy the rest of your day. So, how you walk should be
confident enough so that other people can respect you.
Watch your posture
Posture is another tip that gives someone self-confidence. Ideally, how you carry your
body suggests more about how you feel about yourself. If you sprawl your shoulders
and become fidgety, then that is a sign that you are not confident with yourself. So,
standing or sitting upright while having your head up all the time and your shoulders
back would be ideal. It would help if you also kept an unwavering eye contact with the
other party in a friendly manner, as this helps you to be more confident and
commanding in what you do.
Personal advertisement
The next tip is personal advertisement, and this will guide you to carry yourself after
suffering a bad day in office. To explain this, you might be dejected after making a slip-
up on a huge presentation where your employer is not pleased with what you did in
front of your audience. In this case, you might distance yourself from others. So, to
boost yourself out of this mess, you can address yourself in a mirror assuredly while
facing the mirror or even have a small silent meeting at your desk. This will remind you

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that you are still versatile and proud despite the mistake. Through personal
advertisement, you will get back to your winning ways and get an instant energy boost.
Practice gratitude
Practice gratitude is another instrumental step. Usually, whenever we focus on what we
do not have, we will feel dejected. Instead, we should emphasize our energies on what
will make us proud of what we have. Making a comparison and having that feeling that
you have achieved more as compared to others is an excellent way of practicing
gratitude. Instead, one should note down the items which they should count as their
blessings and be thankful for in life and set goals to achieve what they do not have.
Building your relationship with the people you love, enhancing professional
achievements, attaining career goals, or even having better health will have to be listed
and prioritized.
Pay people compliments
Paying people compliments is another pertinent tip. Usually, we might be tempted to
talk about others negatively. This happens mostly when we feel jealous. We might be
tempted to use offensive words which can hurt others. It is recommended that we should
always pick the positives and focus our energies on them. In line with this, giving
positive compliments and engaging in constructive talk is good. This will help you be
focused and optimistic. It will also boost your self-confidence.
Sit up front
You should also sit up front. Back in school, we were tempted to be backbenchers. This
is attributed to a lack of confidence. Instead, to boost one’s self-confidence, we must
sit up front. This means that we should take the front row. You should be confident and
do it over and over, which will explain why you should feel comfortable while picking
the front spot. Again, you will notice how important you have put yourself before others
in your institution.
Speak up
It would help if you also spoke up. Usually, people may be worried when they speak
up in meetings or even during group discussions. They might fear being judged
concerning their look or even their speech. This feeling comes from our minds because
we always feel awkward while addressing something in front of others. To improve on
public speaking skills, one should make it a game. Anytime there is a meeting, at least
give a small speech that will help you gain public confidence, enabling you to share
your opinions and ideas. Leadership skills will be seen the more you participate in
sharing thoughts, particularly in such meetings or discussion groups.

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Exercise
Exercise is another way that helps someone get self-confidence. Having a nature walk
or even gym time refreshes a lot. These will help you feel better and more confident in
pursuing your goals. Some of the exercises that one can do include hiking, bike riding
and going to the gym, as they will help boost physical fitness. Focusing on contributing
is another tip. In this regard, the more you contribute positively to your workplace rather
than receiving compliments or help, then you will be confident. This also entails
focusing on helping others attain their goals.
Focus on contributing
The other important tip is building self-esteem at work. This can be termed a vital
barrier that keeps away negative emotions and mental health conditions such as
depression that may lower one’s confidence towards achieving something. Research
has proved that the more roles that people play in their lives, the more they boost their
self-esteem.
Building self-esteem at work
In today’s modern workplace, many challenges make self-esteem hard to maintain.
Some of them are; the fast pace of work which leads to competition, demands that the
employers have on the workers, working longer hours, and facing cultural differences.
These would team up to lower one’s self- esteem. This is because they might feel they
cannot do enough to attain their set productivity.
Competition is another challenge in the workplace where workers underrate themselves
by feeling that they haven’t contributed anything.
Pursue your passions
Another tip would entail pursuing your passions. Ideally, following what you are
passionate about every day when you are free from work is very important. It might be
reading your favorite novel, researching your holiday travels, watching your favorite
film, or even doing garden work like planting flowers or vegetables (Upadhyay et al.,
2020). You can also spend that leisure time looking for artistic creations that will make
you happier. It can be from your gallery.
The more you do something new in your workplace; you will learn many other ideas
that would be helpful to you in what you are doing.
Track your efforts
It’s tracking your efforts is another way to give you the confidence to accomplish your
goals. Though we tend to forget what we have achieved in the previous periods, we
must write them down whenever we attain a hundred percent. At the end of each period,
you will be so proud of yourself, and this will encourage you to put more effort
whenever you track your work.

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Self-esteem bulletin board
A self-esteem bulletin board is another factor that helps someone have confidence in
what they are doing. This is an idea where one creates bullets on a board or poster about
their accomplishments. These would act as a reminder whenever the person works to
accomplish something. Despite anything, one should always find something that would
make one proud of attaining their goals. This will boost their self confidence and push
them to work even harder.
Stop the negative talk
Stopping negative talk is a crucial step in boosting self-confidence. Even though talking
ill about others is a common practice among humans, it is usually vital for us to cease
from this.
When we can control that urge of negative talk, we will be productive and only focus
on positive critique, which can improve other people’s lives rather than destroying
them. Thus, we should always concentrate on what can make our situation even better.
Besides, we should always be positive instead of focusing our energies on what will
destroy us instead. In an event when we focus on trivial negativities, our self-esteem
would take a beating.
Enhancing your self-efficacy
The last one is enhancing self-efficacy. When we succeed in nurturing our self-efficacy,
the chances are high that we will be effective and have better self-confidence or self-
belief.
Researchers have pointed out four primary ways of upgrading self-efficacy: modeling,
skills mastery, reinterpretation of symptoms, signs, and persuasion.
Modeling
First, modeling helps ensure one focuses on the goal to attain it. Through it, one is
encouraged to look for someone they can look up to in the workplace, and that
individual will give them a sense of direction which will be instrumental in attaining
the set targets. For example, if you are looking to become an actor or a leader, you
should be obliged to look for someone who will mentor you to move closer to the target.
The mentor already has experience in certain aspects in line with the profession or the
activity that you are looking into; thus, it will be easier to attain the set targets (Dwyer,
2019). If you can be lucky to find a mentor who will always find time to attend to your
worries and questions, your self-efficacy will improve significantly.
Reinterpretation of signs and symptoms
The next way to enhance your self-efficacy would be skills mastery. This entails
looking for new skills and working towards acquiring them. Through the skills that one
master, it would be easier to attain goals. If the mastery of skills is done repeatedly, the

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chances are high that self-efficacy would be attainable easily (Upadhyay et al., 2020).
However, lack of effort would not be rewarded in this regard. As one goes ahead to
master more skills in line with their line of specialization, they will be fit to conduct
themselves as needed by their profession and the failures will be eliminated. If you are
uncertain how you will master your skills, you will need to focus on breaking tasks into
manageable ones and creating time to handle those tasks effectively.
You can start with the easiest ones; this will boost your self-efficacy and make you
more confident. This is easier to attain, unlike when you are focusing on junks of tasks
at a go.
The other way is reinterpreting symptoms and signs. This can be related to a healthcare
setting as one has to determine which signs and symptoms the patient exhibits. When
building on your self-efficacy, you need to determine the signs and symptoms you are
giving yourself. When you are having a negative reaction, such as anger, it is always
crucial to acknowledge it and work towards dealing with the feeling. This means that it
does not have to be a source of frustrations or discouragements in your life; instead,
you will have to get the job done.
Persuasion
The last way of enhancing your self-efficacy is persuasion, whereby someone else
convinces the other that they are up to the task and should go on with their jobs. This
way, the person being persuaded will work extra hard to meet their goals. However, it
does not usually have to come from a third party as one can even convince themselves
internally to attain their goals. This is whereby one reminds themselves of their
capabilities and set goals that will be instrumental in achieving self-efficacy. By doing
so, it would be easier to attain set goals.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, there are many ways to boost your confidence and self esteem. One of
the most effective is by learning how to use positive affirmations. Affirmations are
statements that you tell yourself repeatedly until they become a part of who you are.
They can be written on paper, spoken out loud or even whispered in your mind, but the
key is to always keep them with you so that they become a part of your daily routine.
Boosting someone’s self esteem will lead to major changes and help them be on top.
The feeling of high self esteem and confidence will lead to success and achieving goals
easier.
References
Dwyer, L. P. (2019). Leadership self-efficacy: review and leader development
implications. Journal of Management Development.
Upadhyay, D., Talwar, S., Tiwari, S., & Gujral, H. (2020). Self-confidence a
demeanor to emotional intelligence. Proteus Journal, 11(11), 120-134.

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Houssem Eddine Ben Messaoud (2022). From personal experience. CEO at Gestion
Hôtelière de la Capitale, Québec
Book: Personal Confidence & Motivation (2013) by MTD Training