The confidence myth: Why the humble thrive

A lack of humility can blind individuals to their weak spots.

 

Confidence is a prized asset. High-octane business gurus and self-help experts often offer some variant of “fake it till you make it” as the secret to success. And a 2012 study at the University of California Berkeley’s Haas School of Business found that those perceived as more confident frequently leapfrog their more unassuming colleagues, with self-assurance proving an apparent substitute for competence. 

 

This is a mistake, according to Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic of University College London, author of a recent book on the topic. In Confidence: The Surprising Truth About How Much You Need and How to Get it, he argues that the “confidence illusion” (“believe in yourself and the world is your oyster”) could be costing organisations and individuals dear – promoting unrealistic expectations, and an inability to recognise shortcomings.

 

It’s difficult to disagree with the idea that the cult of confidence has taken hold in certain corners of life. US psychologist Jean Twenge analysed data from the American Freshman Survey between 1966 and 2010, and found that the number of US college students rating their abilities as “above average” on a range of skills has surged dramatically. For “writing ability”, it has leapt from around 30 per cent to almost 50 per cent, and for “leadership ability”, the proportion has increased by almost 20 percentage points to over 60 per cent. But how could such attitudes be harming businesses?

 

Chamorro-Premuzic thinks firms risk mistaking confidence for competence, hiring or promoting outspoken individuals at the expense of more talented employees. It’s a reasonable concern. Professor Cameron Anderson, leader of the Haas Business School study cited earlier, has argued that workers continually fail to acknowledge the errors of colleagues with large egos. 

 

And the perils of the confidence cult also show up in hiring practices, says Chamorro-Premuzic. The pre-eminence of the job interview as an assessment tool, for example, risks skewing a company’s hiring towards talented self-promoters, rather than those with real skills and achievements. Carefully designed tests that correlate people’s self-presentation with their actual behaviour is one way to get around this, he thinks.

 

But what about cases where overconfidence is usually seen as a necessity? The frequently-cited statistic that 90 per cent of startups fail is often wheeled out as a justification for wilful blindness on the part of entrepreneurs – you have to believe you’re capable of defying the odds in order to stand any chance of making it.

 

Successful entrepreneurs like the late Steve Jobs may have displayed a near-evangelical belief in their own ability to change the world, but this model is likely to be the exception according to Chamorro-Premuzic, not the rule. Such attitudes can actually stand in the way of success by prohibiting a focus on what you need to get better at. Instead, tennis star Roger Federer’s well-known relentless hunger for self-improvement may be a better model.

 

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