Don't Confuse Comfort with Competence

Scott Anthony, in Don't Confuse Passion with Competence,  reminds me of another basic confusion. I often hear people saying "I don't need training. I am comfortable with this".

Yes, you nay be comfortable doing something. Doesn't mean you are any good at it.

Often this is said about public speaking and presenting. Many managers will send their staff to a presentation skills class, but not attend themselves. Ever. Because these managers feel they are "Comfortable getting up in front of people."

Unfortunately, if you were to see some of these managers "getting up in front of people", you would see misplaced confidence.

Comfort and Competence are two different things. Trainer talk about learners being conscious and competent: aware of what they are doing, and if it works; versus unconscious: lacking the awareness to match their actions to their results.

Unconscious Incompetents don't know what they are doing and are not getting results. So they insist the problem is something besides them. In training these are the people who say "Yes, but with a real customer I would not have done that..."

Conscious is the best place to be to improve your performance. A conscious learner knows there are things they do not know, and so have a desire to learn. They recognize that they could be doing things differently and better.

Unconscious learners? Not so much. They have to be led to a place of self awareness where they connect their lack of results to their own performance. If they are getting successful results, they need help understanding what they did to achieve success. This is the challenge of coaching.

Where are you? Getting results but not sure why? Or having trouble duplicating your success in different situations?

Don't confuse your comfort with competence.