Employee View of a Manager's Low Self-Esteem

A manager had a low self-esteem. In working towards increasing his self-esteem, he analyzed the impact of low self-esteem on himself as well as on his employees. He found that low self-esteem created a sense of self-doubt that limited his ability to make firm decisions on a timely basis. In turn, he believed that diminished his employee's confidence in him as well as their confidence in the work they were doing for him.

I agreed with his perspective on this, but asked him to consider this additional thought as well: "When you are down on yourself, when you lack self-confidence, you cause people to wonder if your successes are due to your professional and personal competence or, instead, if you accomplish things simply by having strokes of luck."

Or put a different way, when you lack self-confidence you limit people's ability to give you credit for your hard work because they lack confidence that you were truly capable of doing it.

About me: Dan Pelley is an educator specializing in management training and development programs for supervisors and other first-line managers in Connecticut (CT), Massachusetts (MA) and Rhode Island (RI). The issue recited above came from a participant in one of his supervisory management development programs.

Copyright © 2011 Daniel W. Pelley
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