We need to boost our sense of total confidence.
Over the last few speaking engagements, I've been focusing on this issue. I believe that the reason people get selfish is because they lose their total confidence: themselves, the groups they are a part of and the greater community. Layoffs, cutbacks and scare-stories have infiltrated corporate cultures to the point of freezing them in the headlights of the coming change-train. Practical is now paranoid.
People hoard great ideas, because they fear they'll never have a good one again. If you had several good ideas and confidence you'd come up with more — you'd likely give them away.
The last year or so has shattered business confidence and personal confidence at the same time. Many of us wonder if we'll ever make the same money as we made in 2004, 2005 or 2006. Many of us wonder if we'll ever get our spare time back. Many of us have 'survivor's guilt', believing that we are partly to blame for our company's recent hardships.
This lack of confidence, manifested in scarcity thinking, is bad for you and bad for the groups you belong to. To help reverse this, I suggest you shift your information diet from negative news to constructive information. Instead of wasting valuable time reading, thinking or talking about the economy, spend the time aggregating some know-how.
Learn more about how things work, especially things that can improve your personal resume. Spend an hour at the bookstore, poring over business books that offer a peek into the future or useful tools for you to boost performance on the job. The more you do this, the more confident you'll get in life and at work. I credit this practice to my personal success during the last recession in '01-'03. I read my way out of the funk and rose up inside my company like a Phoenix when the market came back.
You can also negotiate to take on a mentor that can give you relevant know-how. These days, everyone is taxed for time. Find a mentor that you think would supercharge your knowledge base. Offer to trade time for advice. Be willing to do a 'dirty-work' task for your mentor. When you get one, as I did in '01, you'll find that your confidence will soar.
Confident people believe in abundance: There's enough to go around. There's enough to share.
