Are You Good at What You Do?
Think of your performance in a major aspect of your life – the context could be as a sportsperson, a coach, a parent, your job/career, or anything else that’s important to you or you are proud of.
Before you read on, pause reflect on, and answer the following two questions, rating yourself on a scale of,
- very good
- good
- above average
- average
- below average
- bad
- very bad
- In your chosen context, how good are your behavioural and communicating skills?
- In your chosen context, how knowledgeable are you in the appropriate background concepts, models, psychology, etc.?
This is a purely self-reflective exercise. Keep your self-rating in mind as you read on.
Have you ever heard of the Dunning Kruger Effect? It relates to a paper published by psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger in 19991. It originally assessed people’s grammar, logical reasoning and social skills but the same research has been applied across many domains spanning both behavioural and mental skills.
The short story is this: People with low skills (as assessed by independent, empirical measures) tend to rate themselves as better than they actually are; and conversely, people who have demonstrably/measurably high skills rate themselves lower than they actually are. There’s even a correlation as to what degree. For example (on our scale above) people whose measured performance is ‘very bad’ may rate themselves as ‘very good’ (I knew a guy in my martial arts gym like this), those who rate themselves as ‘below average’ tend to perform ‘above average’, etc.
An important caveat here, the Dunning Kruger effect is often described as a measure of ‘stupidity’ – probably because the term ‘ignorance’ is used. But ignorance and stupidity are not the same. Ignorance is simply ‘not knowing’. I’m ignorant of many (many!) things, but that is not stupidity. In the words of the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates, “The only thing I know is that I know nothing”, and he’s considered to be one of the wisest thinkers who has ever lived.
In NLP terms we might find a correlation with a person’s ‘convincer strategy’. A convincer strategy consists of the see-hear-feel input/feedback, and whether you are convinced after, ‘one time’, a ‘number of times’, a ‘period of time’ (irrespective of number of times), or if you’re ‘never convinced’.
Here’s an example: let’s say your chosen context is playing basketball. Ask yourself if, as a basketball player, you scored a perfect point/basket once in one game – and you’re a ‘one timer convincer’ – does that really make you a good point scorer? If so, what does that do for your attitude towards training and playing in future games? Might that not lead to complacency?
My point in this article is to challenge you, to ask lots of questions for you to reflect on. These are questions I regularly ask myself in every context – in my job, as a friend, as a learner, everything! My intention is for us all to constantly improve, to not get complacent, and to be the best versions of ourselves we can all be.
Always hold in mind that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, and continuous evidenced based honest feedback is essential, this is why coaching is so important. So, no matter how good you think you are, keep learning and honing your craft, your skills, knowledge and abilities. In fact, from the Dunning Kruger research we can conclude that the sign of a real expert is that they are always learning and trying harder.
It might occur to you as you read this that, “Oh no! if I always question my abilities, I’ll never be secure in my thoughts and feelings about myself”. This is why real skill requires resilience and maybe therapy to overcome personal and more general traumas and overcoming anxiety (click the links to find out how).
I’ll finish with those questions again;
- In your chosen context, how good are your behavioural and communicating skills?
- In your chosen context, how knowledgeable are you in the appropriate background concepts, models, psychology, etc.?
If you’re supremely confident, based on explicit, measurable, repeatable, empirical evidence that you are ‘very good’ – great, you are what the world needs. If not, the follow up question becomes important – so, what (if anything) are you going to do about it?
High performance athletes need a good coach. High performance in any domain requires a good mental coach. If you’re ready to take the next step, contact me for one-on-one coaching, or training for your group or organisation.
1 Kruger, J., & Dunning, D. (1999). Unskilled and unaware of it: how difficulties in recognizing one’s own incompetence lead to inflated self-assessments. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77(6), 1121.