I often tweet and write about how important it is to build appearance is when personal professional brand but what about confidence?

First impressions are vital when meeting a colleague, client or future boss, for the first time.  The common cliché’s of “dress for success”, “dress for the job you want not the job you have”, “first impressions count” are all valid and great phrases but when it comes down to reality the main ingredient you need to create successful professional image is inner strength – confidence and belief in yourself that you can do it.

Self-confidence is an important key to success in any walk of life. People with self-confidence are noticed more. I have been coaching on professional image for almost nine years and have found a lack of trust and self-confidence can distract even the most vibrant professional from truly succeeding. Coaching professionals from all levels of management has clearly shown me that:

• Many are not willing to change the way they visually present themselves because of lack of confidence. They know they need to in prove their appearance but lack the confidence in themselves.
• Many lack belief in their capabilities to manage a team.
• Many lack belief that they can present in front of 5 or 50 people.
• Many allow themselves to be taken advantage of because they lack the inner strength to stand up for what they believe.
• Many know they are being limited by their inner beliefs but “don’t have the time to work on it”.

Building and continually developing our inner strength and belief in ourselves is an essential ingredient in building a complete professional image. Quite frankly you can look great but if you lack confidence then all the designer clothes and makeup cannot help you.

So how do we develop our inner strength?

Developing that ingredient of inner strength will be different for each one of us. There are a number of things you can consciously do to build self-confidence:

• Daily affirmations – Negative and dis- empowering beliefs are the source of our self-sabotage, and through daily affirmations and declarations we are able to imprint in our mind a new way of thinking, new beliefs that are empowering, boost self-esteem and develop self-confidence.
• Regular Meditation – If you experience anxiety as a result of a lack of self-confidence, you can use meditation to release your anxiety. Affirmations and visualisations are additional techniques you can use during meditation to feel more self-assured.
• Setting daily/weekly/monthly goals – If need be, break your goals into smaller, more manageable tasks. Don’t forget to reward yourself when you succeed.
• Daily lists - A good way to improve your personal worth is to make a list of your accomplishments every day. You will be surprised to know how many positive acts you perform every day in life, but which you don’t notice. Once you start looking at this list, your self-confidence will boom.
• Personal self-talks - This is the communication that no one else sees or hears. Self-talk is what composes those silent conversations we have with ourselves. Little internal phrases like: “All right, way to go” tell our nervous system that we approve. Other phrases like: “You idiot, what’s your problem” sends a completely different message. We can use self-talk to build up our self-confidence or to tear it apart.
• Mentor/Coach – Find a mentor who can help you reach your goal. Most people, who have done well in life, have a mentor who has traveled the same road on which they are traveling today.
• Fake it till you make it – Sometimes you may be placed into a situation where you have to act confident and have a strong attitude. Stepping out of your comfort zone can be extremely rewarding.

How do I build confidence?

Well it is definitely not easy but I use a combination of the above tips. I say daily affirmations; I set myself daily and weekly goals; definitely fake it many times and then I set myself BIG challenges that often take a year to achieve. Not because that are difficult but because it takes me one year to build confidence. Last year I agreed to go tandem ski diving with my 16-year-old son. It has taken 8 months of self power talks but I finally “faked it until I made it’ and did it (yes that is me in the picture). Now ski diving have nothing to do with business and professionalism but a lot to do with the way I believed in my capabilities. It was the most amazing sense of accomplishment.

When building your career in a competitive market, building self-confidence can make all the difference in the world. Confidence can turn that feeling of dread into exhilarating excitement. It can open new doors, shake up your expectations and help you to grow in ways you never thought possible. So what are the steps for building confidence?