Imagine that someone suggests you put yourself forward for something. It might be a speaking spot, or an award, or even a role which needs someone like you to lead it.
Your first thought is most likely to start preparing. Sifting through, looking for any weak spots which need to be strengthened. Working out all the possible things they might ask about, and making sure you have answers for them all, well in advance.
Here’s the strange part. You can answer pretty much any possible question or concern they may raise, so clearly the preparation works beautifully.
And yet your discomfort at the prospect remains exactly as strong as it was at the outset.
What’s going on?
Two Weekends, Every Objection Covered
Daniel, a senior specialist in a large organisation, was very good at his job. He was the person to whom people brought questions that nobody else could answer. His expertise was legendary within the company.
Naturally, when a speaking spot opened up at an industry conference, his manager suggested that Daniel put his name forward for it. So he did what he assumed was expected.
He prepared.
He spent two weekends going over every possible question which people might ask, every conceivable technical objection others might raise. He examined the possible edge cases, and predicted the inevitable awkward interruptions from people in the room who had done the research and come to a different conclusion.
He had detailed answers for all of it, answers he could give at the drop of a hat.
His preparation was on point – after all, it was his preparation and focus in the past which had made his work so good.
One Line On The Form
Now that he was fully prepared for every eventuality, it was time to complete the form to apply to be a speaker. With the confidence of a person who knows that they know their stuff, he opened the form.
Name. Job Title. Proposed Topic. All absolutely fine, no problems.
And then he hit that line – or rather, THAT line hit HIM.
“Why should delegates want to hear from you?”
He stopped. He closed the form. He did something else which urgently needed his attention.
He reopened the form a few more times over the following days, and each time that box glared at him, and he closed the form again. He never got round to completing it, so he never got the slot.
What really hit Daniel later was what he realised about his preparation – he’d spent two entire weekends preparing to face a risk, but the risk he was preparing to face was not the one which stopped him.
What he couldn’t actually face, he began to realise, was the thought of his name being in the conference programme, because that would mean that people knew that he had wanted to be there. That was the risk which stopped him.
There’s the point.
There is the risk you prepare for, and then there is the risk you actually feel.
The risk you prepare for is the risk of being judged on your work. Someone questioning your thinking, your methodology, your conclusions. Someone picking a hole in your argument, or uncovering a gap in your experience. It’s a familiar risk, and it’s one you can manage, because it’s the sort of thing you’ve faced and been judged on for much of your life, and you know how to prepare for it in advance.
On the other hand, the risk you feel is the risk of being seen to want something. The slot, the attention, the award, to be the one who gets chosen. This risk is one for which there is no way to prepare.
Think of the last thing you held back from putting yourself forward for; on which part of it did you actually falter?
Why There’s Nothing To Prepare
The work that you do, that is outside of you. It has its own standards, which it either meets or doesn’t. It has evidence which you can point to in its support. It can be discussed, debated, improved. And absolutely none of it means anything about you personally. We’ve explored this in previous posts – your work isn’t you and you are not your work. If someone criticises your work, it’s the work being criticised, not you.
Wanting, however, is rather different. Wanting has no standard against which to be measured. There is no evidence to which you can point to support wanting. Wanting is very much about you, personally – it is you, raising your hand, and stating quite categorically “I want that”. Which is as personal as it gets.
For most of us, being chosen has followed and been a result of our work. You do a good job, and someone picks you. You do more good work, and you get the promotion. You get the clients, because you’ve done great work with previous clients.
You do the work, you get chosen. Along with this, the work does the wanting for you as well, and it tends to do it very privately. Nobody really knows that you were secretly hoping for the promotion, because the promotion arrived on merit.
But when you put your hand up, when you declare “I want this”, that reverses the order. The wanting goes first, publicly, and the work follows behind to offer the supporting evidence to justify your want.
Which is precisely why no amount of preparation makes it feel any easier or any safer – all of the preparation strengthens the aspect which was never at risk in the first place, whereas the part which does feel at risk – being seen to be publicly wanting the Thing – remains as exposed as ever.
Fair Enough, When It’s Someone Else
OK, so what do we do with this?
As with so many things, awareness is the first step, so name the actual risk. Next time you find you are hesitating to put your name forward, pause and ask yourself “What specifically about this feels risky?” You might find the initial answer is something about the work – test that. Is there really an argument against the work which you couldn’t defend? Almost certainly not, when you look at it properly. You can probably defend every single point you made in the work. That realisation alone is very helpful, because it rules the work out as the problem to be fixed, so you don’t then spend endless hours preparing to defend it.
If you do find yourself deep in preparation, again just pause and ask yourself what the preparation is actually for. If it is genuinely making the work better, that’s good. On the other hand, if the work is great on its own and yet you still find yourself hiding behind yet more preparation – well that’s a sign that you need to re-evaluate and ask what risk you are actually trying to mitigate.
There’s also something else that’s worth noticing, and this one can be rather interesting.
Think of times when someone else has put themselves forward, and they get whatever it is they said they wanted. The promotion, the new job, the award, whatever it was. As you think about them, notice that pretty much nobody thought any less of them for wanting it and going for it. If anything, most people probably thought “Good on them – they wanted it, they went for it, and they got it. Nice one.”
Indeed, what did you think of them, wanting it, going for it, and getting it?
Which means that the judgement for which you are bracing yourself very rarely actually happens…
The Box That Asks “Why You?”
When you stop to think about it, it’s pretty obvious that wanting something you are good enough to merit is a perfectly normal and reasonable thing. To be considered, you just need to be seen to want it – after all, why would they consider anyone who didn’t show that they wanted it?
Daniel’s form sat finished in every box but one.
Which form are you still holding, finished in every part except the one that asks “why you?”
If you’d like to explore this in much greater depth, looking at the decisions running underneath the choice to be seen or not, and looking at the cost of remaining in the background, then that’s what “Being Seen on Purpose” in The Overachievers Club explores. See you there?
Or if you’d prefer something lighter, try The Overachievers Quiz – a short, fun, quiz to find out exactly which sort of overachiever you are, and what to do with that information.
Connected Podcast Episode
In the accompanying episode, I tell the story of an award entry I never sent, and what changed the year I did.
Episode 042 – Why Being Seen Feels Risky
Can you defend every part of your work, yet still stall at putting your hand up? Discover the risk all that preparation never reaches.
Relevant Related Blogs and Episodes
When Your Inner Critic Sounds Like Wisdom
The most dangerous inner critic sounds like strategy, not criticism. Here is the test that unmasks it.
Episode 041 – The Visibility Gap
Is your work excellent but barely known beyond the people who refer you? Discover why good work stops travelling on its own, and whose job it is now.
