Are you ‘Pot Bound’? What’s the impact on your potential?
 
We have a very tall eucalyptus tree in our front yard. It must be well over 10 metres tall. We’ve watched this tree grow over the past 10 or so years from a sapling that was given to me by a friend who used to have it in a pot in her backyard. She didn’t have the space to plant it in the ground and it was very pot bound. She knew it would never reach its potential in the pot and so she asked me to plant it in the ground. It is now definitely in a place it can reach its potential.

Are you pot bound?

I wonder how many of us allow ourselves to stay pot bound? In an organisational context, are we in jobs that we’re good at, but that no longer stretch us? Are we allowed to spread both our roots and our branches? If not, what’s our pot made of? Is it organisational constraints, a lack of encouragement and support, have you developed your capability in your current role to an extent that others don’t want to lose you from that role (i.e. the plant looks great where it is, and they want to keep it there, even if it’s not best for the plant)? Could it be your own confidence, mindset and belief systems, or something else? How do you know when you’ve moved beyond your comfort zone and actually become pot bound? And what impact is this having on your potential?

Are you manifesting your potential?

John Whitmore, in ‘What is Performance?’ (Coaching for Performance, 2002) suggests that on average, we only manifest about 40% of our potential in the workplace. Does this mean we aren’t able to even fill our pots, or are we actually pot bound? I would suggest that often we’re probably pot bound, either by our own beliefs or by organisational structures, processes and lack of support. Perhaps we just need nutrients and more sunlight, or perhaps we actually need to increase the size of our pot, or even be planted in the ground. If this is the case, how do know we’ve reached this point?

How do I know it’s time to replant?

I think the first sign is that of being aware of wanting to move out of your comfort zone. You may have a sense that you’re capable of more, even if you do enjoy your current role. You may feel bored, or unchallenged, you may have a sense of your increased capability and confidence, or you may feel that you are no longer a good fit with the company or team you’re working in. Finally, you may just feel restricted by the status quo.

Moving to a bigger pot

If this is the case, it may be time to look for a bigger pot. First become aware of what your pot is made of and then have a look at what a better fit would look like. What would allow you room to grow both your roots and branches? If you’re not sure how, consider coaching. This is a great way to tap into your potential and to explore a pot or patch of land that will allow you to reach your potential. 

Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

​​Laurenne Di Salvo is an Accredited Coach (ICF), Corporate Trainer and Learning & Development Consultant. She enables individuals and groups to take the next step in their development through evidenced based coaching practices and learning programs.

#potbound #potential #coaching #development #learning #challenge #strengths #comfortzone #discomfortzone #growthmindset #courage

Have you ever found yourself doing things that you are competent at, but that you don’t particularly enjoy? While you may not actively dislike the tasks, they certainly don’t energise you and perhaps they even leave you feeling bored. Maybe you’ve thought about moving into a new area of work because you already have the skills. It feels like the practical, sensible choice, but your heart’s just not in it.

I sometimes explore these situations with clients with the thought starter “just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.”

This can apply at work, in making career decisions and in your personal life. The nett result of ignoring ‘just because you can, doesn’t mean you should’ is that you often feel frustrated, dissatisfied or even bored.

Why is this a problem?

If you spend a lot of time doing things just because you can, there’s no time and space to do the thing things that you really enjoy, the things that keep you in flow, that light you up and energise you. You may experience the satisfaction of a job well done, but this is different from the satisfaction you feel when doing something you believe really represents you properly, that you feel proud to have completed well.

A different approach

What if you took a different approach and tapped into those things you really enjoy, rather than those things that you believe you ‘should’ do. One way to do this is to identify and draw on your ‘signature strengths’ rather than on your ‘learned strengths’.

To identify your signature strengths, think about what gets you into flow. You know, that state where you get completely absorbed in a task and lose track of time. You often know you’re using your signature strengths when you feel energised, engaged and motivated.  Ask yourself, does this idea/work/activity energise me? Do you feel ‘in flow’ when doing it or thinking about it? If not, you may be using a ‘learned strength’. This is one you’ve developed based on need, rather than one that comes naturally to you.

If I was to give you an example, I can absolutely do detail oriented work. I can even do it quite well if I put my mind to it. However, I don’t enjoy it and I feel quite drained of energy when I spend too much time on these tasks. This doesn’t mean I should never do work of this nature. In fact, it’s really important that I can do this, as we all need to do detail oriented work at times. However, for me, I would be ill advised to work in a role where close attention to detail and routine were key aspects of the job, as this doesn’t draw on my signature strengths and it’s not what I enjoy. That is, just because I can, doesn’t mean I should.

What's the benefit?

Why does this even matter? Well, the research suggests that when we draw on our signature strengths we're happier and more productive.  This has certainly been true for me. So, if you’re looking to move into a new role, think about what would best allow you to use your signature strengths. If you intend to stay put, think about how you could recraft your role a little to allow greater use of your strengths. What projects could you get involved in? How could you do your existing role a little differently?

I wonder, how often are you in a ‘just because I can, doesn’t mean I should’ situation? What will you do differently?

How can I learn about my signature strengths and how to apply them?

Not sure what your signature strengths are or how to apply them? You can start by doing the VIA Character Strengths Survey, or the Gallup Strengths Survey. Not sure how to apply your strengths at work to allow you to do the best job you can? Not sure what you would like to be doing? Let’s connect and we can work through this together. 
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Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo

Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

​​Laurenne Di Salvo is a Development Coach, Corporate Trainer and Learning & Development Consultant. She enables individuals and groups to take the next step in their personal and professional development through evidenced based coaching practices and learning programs.

#strenghts #energy #flow #signaturestrengths #viacharacterstengths #gallupstrengths

Dealing with ambiguity is a competency that often comes up in the workplace and is something my clients often talk to me about, both in a personal and professional context.

What is ambiguity and why is it desirable?

Dealing with ambiguity is about coping effectively with change, it’s about being able to make decisions and to act on them without necessarily having a complete picture, without full information. It’s about being able to sit comfortably with a level of risk and uncertainty. Unsurprisingly, this makes many people decidedly uncomfortable.

While some of us are better at ambiguity than others, the good news is that dealing with ambiguity is something we can develop. Why do we need to, you ask? Well, as I’m sure you know, the environment we work in is changing rapidly. Many of us have been exposed to at least one, and often many company restructures. Technology is impacting the way we work, with many people working off site, or without a fixed desk and the pace of change often means decisions need to be made quite quickly.

What could ambiguity look like?

Ambiguity shows up in many common situations that start well before you enter the workplace. A few of my own examples would be choosing a university course at high school with little life experience; travelling overseas on a one-way ticket with limited dollars, knowing I would get work, but not being sure what, how, or even in which country; living in share households; starting a romantic relationship. All these situations relied on an element of trust that things would be ok, as I didn’t have full information in any of these situations. Instead, I learned to make decisions and to problem solve based on the information I had at the time.

Your own similar experiences will have provided fantastic experience and learning that can be applied in a professional context where you may experience one or more of the following:

• Stepping into a management role and not being sure how to lead your new team
• Changing career and not knowing where it will lead you
• Managing a project when you don’t have complete information, or the goalposts change
• Starting a new business and not being sure where your next piece of work will come from
• You might be in the middle of a restructure and you don’t know what the future will look like

The impact of ambiguity

The thing about ambiguity is that it embodies uncertainty and as such, can result in feelings of overwhelm, stress, fear and can prevent us from moving forward or from implementing the actions we need to take.

Managing ambiguity

Your ability to manage ambiguity is linked to how much you trust yourself to cope with change and to problem solve on the spot if things don’t go according to plan.

There are a number of things you can do to build your ambiguity muscle:

1. Apply a learning mindset - you don’t have to be perfect and you will learn so much from ‘testing the waters’ and perhaps even getting a few things wrong.
2. Manage the overwhelm – you can reduce overwhelm by taking small steps. Often you don’t need to implement big actions all at once. Absolutely start with the end in mind, but take small, incremental steps to get started. This not only reduces overwhelm, but allows you to more easily change direction if necessary when you have more information.
3. Focus on problem solving – draw on your ability to problem solve. Trust that you will be able to deal with what happens as it happens, rather than needing to have an answer for everything up front.
4. As Nike would say, ‘Just do it’ – be aware of a tendency towards perfectionism and balance this with action. Again, smaller steps can make this easier.
5. Redefine success – appreciate that success can be as much about managing the ambiguity as it is about achieving the result. Make managing the ambiguity your goal and celebrate each win along the way.
6. Manage stress – this is a whole other blog! The key though is to know the stress management techniques that work for you. Often this is acknowledging that you only really have two choices, change the situation, or change your mindset.
7. Focus on communication – ask questions and check your assumptions, ensure you provide as much information as you can for others and ask for feedback on small steps as you move forward. Finding a trusted sounding board is also a great idea when problem solving.

Finally, remember that managing ambiguity is not something that you either can or can’t do. It’s something you learn and the best way to learn something new is to practice, so pick situations that are less important for you and have a go at acting on the information you have right now.
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If you need some support developing your ability to manage ambiguity, give me a call on 0413 776 564 or learn more at www.harvestcoaching.com.au.
 
Until next time (whatever that looks like), take care.
​
Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo

Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

​​Laurenne Di Salvo is an Accredited Coach (ICF), Corporate Trainer and Learning & Development Consultant. She enables individuals and groups to take the next step in their development through evidenced based coaching practices and learning programs.
 
#ambiguity #change #coaching #growthmindset #learning #development #stressmanagement #courage #personaldevelopment #professionaldevelopment

Jump in the deep end, or climb down the ladder? Moving out of your comfort zone.

Do you have a preferred approach to moving out of your comfort zone? We’re often told to ‘just jump’, but we’re not all ‘jumpers’. Some of us prefer to test the waters first.

To use a swimming pool metaphor, I find some people like to jump directly into the deep end, whilst others prefer to climb down the ladder one rung at a time. Both approaches are valid and both approaches work if they are the right one for you. When we sometimes run into trouble is when we’re encouraged to jump, but our preference is actually to climb down the ladder.

To put this into context, jumping could look like quitting your job and moving into a new area of study or a new industry. Climbing down the ladder could look like continuing in your current role while completing new studies, or volunteering in another industry to see if you like it before resigning from your current role.

There are also options in between. For instance, you may choose not to step on every rung of the ladder, but if you aren’t comfortable with jumping, then don’t. Rather, consider whether you need to step on all the rungs, or if you could perhaps miss a couple. This might look like cutting back to part time work while you study, or it could mean you make a decision with a little less information than you usually would, or it could be that you look for a similar role, but in an industry you would like to move into, rather than looking for a new role in a new industry.

The key is to understand how you like to make change. This includes knowing what level risk you are comfortable with, what level of risk your current life circumstances suggest is realistic for you, what quantity of information and research you need to make decisions and what support network you have around you. Sometimes jumping in the deep end is absolutely appropriate and sometimes it’s not. If it’s not, take the time and space to explore information, ideas and options until you are ready to push away from the ladder, and if it takes a little longer than it would for a ‘jumper’, that’s ok.  Likewise, if for you it’s time to jump, enjoy the leap. Most importantly, honour your preferences and what’s important to you.

If you would like a sounding board and some support to determine which option could work best for you, give me a call on 0413 776 564.

​Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo

Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

​Laurenne Di Salvo is a Development Coach, Corporate Trainer and Learning & Development Professional. She enables individuals and groups to take the next step in their personal or professional development through evidenced based coaching practices and learning programs.

We all have blind spots. You know, those things others seem to know about us that we can’t see for ourselves, or perhaps it’s something we’re aware of in general, but we miss in specific instances, or we may be aware of our behaviour, but miss the impact it has on others. Whichever way, if we’re not aware of these behaviours or needs, they can trip us up and impact our interactions with others.

As always, the first step in doing something about a blind spot is awareness. And yet, having light shone onto a blind spot can be very challenging. It can have us questioning ourselves and our way of being and it can impact our confidence. It can absolutely feel like criticism, but it’s usually not.  Really, it’s an opportunity for growth and personal development and as such, it's a gift.

So how do we lessen the sting and increase the learning? I think there are a number of key steps:

1. Approach any feedback around blind spots with a learning mindset.  

Be curious. What does the behaviour, approach or mindset look like in different contexts? That is, how does the behaviour show up for us?

For example, while I’m not proud of it, I know it doesn’t bring out the best in me if I don’t feel heard. This may show up in responses that are a little sharper than I intended, or I may interrupt instead of allowing someone to finish what they’re saying. The trick for me is to look further and see if needing to be heard actually shows up in other places that I’m a little less aware of. I need to be attuned to the signs that may be more subtle, but may still impact my interactions with others. This may be needing to finish a story, or being upset when someone interrupts me. Then I need to understand the impact this has on those I’m interacting with.

2. Create Space

Viktor Frankl says that “between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

I think the next step in addressing blind spots is to create space. Once we are aware of a trigger, or of situations where we tend to slip into default behaviour that isn’t helpful for us (this could be holding back from saying what we need to say, it could be blaming others rather than being accountable, it could be repetitive patterns of behaviour with family members or colleagues), we then need to create the space to allow us to be more proactive in our responses. We can do this by breathing, we can do this by being curious about and observing our reactions, we can do this by acknowledging the emotion we’re feeling and then reappraising the situation and our response options. These are just a few of many options to create space. 

3. Explore New Responses

This is where we get to play with new responses. Now that we know what we’re doing and we know the response we will get with our default behaviour or mindset, we can use the space we’ve created to think about some alternative options. We can give them a try and see what the result is. How does the situation change? How do we feel using this alternative approach? Is it more helpful for us? Is it better received by others? Does it help us achieve our goals more effectively? If yes, keep doing this. If not, try another approach. This is a great chance to explore, to experiment and importantly, to learn.

4. Practice Self-Compassion

Practising self-compassion isn’t actually a final step. It’s really something to implement the whole way through. Remember that no one is perfect. No one gets it right all the time and no one expects us to. And while some situations may not bring out the best in us, in most situations we probably behave very well and we probably do get it right. However, we are human and as such, we are fallible. What defines us is how we view our imperfections. This is where we circle back to implementing a learning mindset and the best way to do this is with curiosity and without judgement.

So, notice what happened and if it happens again, use this as an opportunity to identify your triggers and to play with new ways of responding.

Will it always be comfortable? Probably not. Will it enable growth, learning and personal development? Absolutely, if you let it.

Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo

Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

​Laurenne Di Salvo is a Development Coach, Corporate Trainer and Workshop Facilitator. She enables individuals and groups to take the next step in their personal or professional development through evidenced based coaching practices and learning programs.

A key component in our personal development and wellbeing is increasing self-awareness around our core values. When talking about values, we’re talking about what’s most important to us in life and this will be different for everyone. In fact, it will be different for each of us at different stages in our lives as our priorities, situation and relationships shift and evolve.

When was the last time you thought about your values?

I wonder, when was the last time you really thought about your values. If I asked you, “what are your top five values?” could you answer me? If you couldn’t, that would actually be quite standard and I also think quite fair.  After all, we’ve got a lot going on. Yet, knowing our values and importantly, ensuring our actions are aligned with our values is an important element of wellbeing.

When we’re out of alignment

Have you ever noticed how you feel when a situation, or someone’s behaviour (maybe even your own) doesn’t match with your values? You may feel out of alignment, or like things aren’t quite right. You may even feel anxious, angry, or you may feel conflicted. You may notice these feelings reflected in your thoughts, or even in your body. Notice, where does this sit for you?

Generally, a misalignment in values and actions doesn’t bring out the best in us. Notice what happens to your communication skills and coping skills. Generally, they take a step backwards.

In contrast, when our values and actions are aligned, this can light us up and give us energy. We may feel a greater sense of wellbeing and purpose.

How do you tap into your values and ensure they’re aligned with your actions?

Step 1: Identify your core values
There are many exercises available to help you tap into your core values. I often use one based on a tool produced by The Coaching Tools Company. You can download their tool here.

Step 2: Understand how these values show up in your life
Think about:

• How you express your values
• Which of your behaviours are consistent with your values?
• Which aren’t?
• What you would say if someone said “How do you demonstrate [insert value here] in your life?” or “How do other people demonstrate [insert value here]?”

The same value can show up differently for different people
We don’t all demonstrate our values in the same way. The same value can show up quite differently for different people. For instance, let’s take the value ‘creativity’. For one person, this may show up in an artistic sense, for someone else it may be around ways of thinking or their approach, and for yet others, it may be more to do with innovation. It’s therefore important to understand how your values shows up in your life, your actions and behaviours.

Step 3: If necessary, adjust your behaviour to ensure your values and behaviours are aligned.
If you feel out of alignment, think about what behaviours and actions you could change and what the impact would be on you. Use your values as a guide for your behaviours.

A couple of points worth noting:

• Your core values can change over time. They are not fixed.
• Your non-core values are also important – not having a value in your top 5 doesn’t mean it isn’t important to you. It just may not be a 'must honour' value.

If you would like some support to help you gain clarity on what your core values are, how understanding your values can guide your personal and professional development, and the impact of aligning your values and actions on your wellbeing, please give me a call.  

Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo

Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

I’m not a huge fan of New Year’s Resolutions. This is because they often come from a ‘should’ mindset, rather than a ‘choose to’ mindset. I wonder if this is true for you. The goal might be to get fitter, to lose weight, to start a new project and yet, the mindset here is often associated with what you think you ‘should do’. The thing is, ‘should’ rarely lasts, and even if it does, the emotion that goes along with it is often associated with duty or obligation, rathen than with joy and desire.

As an alternative, I’ve often worked with both New Year’s Manifestations and New Year Themes. One or both may work for you too.

New Year’s Manifestations

Similar to New Year’s Resolutions, these are specific things you would like to achieve in 2017. The difference though is that rather than phrasing your goals as something you are ‘going to do’, you phrase them in the present. ‘I am …’ and ‘I have …’ statements work well. For example, I am participating in an exercise class once a week’. ‘I have completed project x with plenty of energy and enthusiasm’.

Effectively these statements are a visualisation of how you would like to see your life from the perspective of them happening now, or having already happened.

The power of manifestations is that they not only require you to really visualise what you want in your life, but they are phrased in the present. This is powerful! Visualising your life as if the change already exists allows you to be more mentally and emotionally committed.

New Year Themes

An alternative approach is to think about a theme or themes you would like to work with for the entire year. This might be around an emotion (e.g. 2017 will be a year of joy, or a year of peace), an approach (e.g. 2017 will be a year of play, of creativity, or of diligence), or it might be a theme of intention (e.g. 2017 will be a year of growth, of consolidation, of acceptance, or of new beginnings).
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I like themes as they give you the space to play with ideas and actions within the framework of the theme. They provide the lens, or approach for your thoughts, actions and mindset for the year.

My themes for 2017 are growth, connection and heart. 

What will 2017 look and feel like for you?

Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo
​
Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

Do you have a favourite artist? I really love Hundertwasser. I love the vibrancy of his work, the colours he uses in his paintings and also his philosophies. He was an artist, an architect and a bit of a trailblazer in the environmental space and he very much brought this into his work.

I have a book on Hundertwasser that I haven't looked at in a long time that I was flicking through today and I have to say, his work makes my heart sing.

Sometimes I get a bit bogged down in day to day activities and forget to do things like just enjoy artwork and notice how it makes me feel. I wonder if this resonates for you? If so, I would highly recommend tapping into some sort of creative pursuit that you do simply for pleasure, not because you have to. It may be doing something creative yourself, or enjoying the creativity of others. It will still tap into the creative part of your brain too.

Notice how it makes you feel. Does it light you up? Does it give you energy? Does it make you smile? If it does, what a great habit to introduce into your life. It doesn't take much. It could be a few minutes looking at an art book, dancing around the loungeroom to one song you love, drawing, writing in a journal, gardening, or whatever feels creative and uplifting for you. 

Have a wonderful and creative week.

Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo
Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

Have you ever wondered how a Coach can help and support you?

Here are 11 great reasons to work with a Coach:

1. A Coach is a great sounding board
A coach is someone you can bounce ideas around with. While a coach will encourage you to explore ideas and may even float a few suggestions, they will not give you advice or tell you what to do. Rather, they will ask you questions to help you dig deep to find the best option for you.

2. Accountability
Sometimes following through is easier if you know someone is expecting you to take action. This helps with commitment and leads into the next point, motivation.

3. Motivation
Coaching can help you to achieve the momentum you require to become and to then stay motivated.

4. Blind Spots
A coach can act like a light house – we can shine light on some of those things you aren’t able to see on your own.

5. Alternative perspectives
Your coach may see a situation or idea a little differently to the way you do. As a result, they may be able to provide an alternative perspective for you to consider. You can then decide if this new perspective is helpful for you.

6. Tools & Strategies
Your coach will have a number of tools and strategies in their toolkit they can share with you. The best bit is that these tools and strategies generally empower you to help yourself, making learning sustainable. You can draw on them whenever you need to.

7. A safe space to explore ideas
The coaching space is a non-judgemental, safe and supported space. This allows you to explore ideas and options to move forward, creating the positive change you would like to see in your life.

8. The right questions
Sometimes finding the right answers requires someone to ask the right questions. Asking the right questions, some of which may well challenge you, is a key skill coaches bring to the coaching relationship.

9. Create positive change
This is what coaching is all about – clarifying and putting plans, actions and mindset in place to allow you to create positive change.

10. Wellbeing
Coaching is a key ingredient in helping you achieve overall wellbeing, be it through working with your values and strengths, or through the application of other evidence based strategies proven to increase wellbeing. Strategies in this space would obviously be tailored to individual needs.

11. Personal Development
Coaching can help increase self-awareness, increase confidence, overcome self-limiting beliefs and manage life stress, amongst other areas of personal development.

This is not an exhaustive list. There are many more great reasons to work with a coach.

If coaching is of interest to you, I would love to have a chat! We can work out if: 1. Coaching is right for you and 2. If I’m the right coach for you. My clients have achieved inspiring results. I’d love to work with you to help you achieve the positive change you want to see in your life too.

Have a wonderful day!
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Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo

Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au
Let's Connect

​​Laurenne Di Salvo is an Accredited Coach (ICF), Corporate Trainer and Learning & Development Consultant. She enables individuals and groups to take the next step in their development through evidenced based coaching practices and learning programs.  

​#coaching #whatiscoaching #personaldevelopment #professionaldevelopment #development #learning #wellbeing #change #blindspots #perspective #soundingboard

Do you ever struggle with confidence when you're learning something new or you're in a new situation?

Many of my clients are quite hard on themselves when they feel they don’t know something, or they don’t know it as well as they would like to. To be honest, I’ve had to work on my own ‘self-talk’ in this space at times.

Many people also suffer from ‘Imposter Syndrome’. You know, that feeling that others will discover that you’re a fraud, that you really don’t know what you’re doing and that you don’t really deserve to be in your job?

There’s a model of learning that I really love here that has helped a few of my clients to ‘reframe’ this mode of thinking. It’s definitely worked for me. It goes by a number of names, including the Four Stages of Learning and the Hierarchy of Competence. It’s a model that was developed by W.S. Howell and it highlights the journey from development to mastery. What better model for coaching!

This model highlights that to achieve mastery of a new skill, we all go through four stages of competence:

1. Unconscious incompetence – This is where we ‘don’t know what we don’t know’. It’s where we aren’t even aware we don’t have the skills in the area we might need them. Emotionally, this area is ok as we aren’t aware of any competency gaps, so we’re not beating ourselves up yet.
2. Conscious incompetence – This is where we become aware we don’t know something or that we don’t have the skills or knowledge we require. While at some level we probably know that it’s impossible to go from not knowing how to do something, to knowing how to do it without passing through this stage, this awareness of our competence gap can leave us feeling a little vulnerable. It can shake our confidence and self-esteem if we don’t recognise this stage as just that, a stage of learning. Think about when you were learning to drive a car. You didn’t expect to be able to drive perfectly the moment you got into the car, yet sometimes this is exactly what we expect when learning other new skills, and it shakes our confidence when we need time and practice. The thing is though, the awareness we don’t know something is incredibly positive as it provides an avenue for learning.
3. Conscious competence – This is where we know how to do something, but we have to really think about. If we go back to learning to drive, it’s the stage where you’re acutely aware of everything you’re doing. You can do it, but you have to think about it very hard. Emotionally this is easier than conscious incompetence, but it can still challenge us, and particularly the impatient amongst us that want to feel like an expert yesterday!
4. Unconscious competence – This is that wonderful stage when you’ve mastered something and you don’t even have to think about it. You know, you’re driving, having a conversation, singing along to the radio and feeling good!

In line with this model is a common theme amongst my clients, and that is their love of learning. This makes sense given coaching is often going to challenge you to develop, to learn and to grow. The thing is that if you love learning, you are regularly going to be a novice for at least a period of time. I would therefore encourage you to:

1. Acknowledge that you will have periods of time where you won’t feel competent yet and that this can be challenging to your self-esteem and confidence. This is normal, but it does not mean that you are a failure, a fraud, or any of the other unkind things you tell yourself. It merely suggests you are on a learning curve.
2. Remember that if you don’t go through these stages, you won’t ever learn something new!

So if you love learning and challenging yourself, Howell’s model can help to normalise the feelings you experience as you move through each stage. There are also strategies you can put in place at each stage to help you maintain your confidence, especially when the skill or knowledge you are acquiring takes a little longer to master. For help with this, please give me a call. I have some strategies in my toolkit that may just help.

Happy learning!

Warmest wishes,

Laurenne Di Salvo
Leadership & Professional Development Coach | Corporate Trainer | Learning & Development Consultant
0413 776 564
www.harvestcoaching.com.au 

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