Asian Woman Focus Newsletter #2

February 2010 ISSUE 2

Inspiring Asian Women everywhere to lead

Empowered, PASSIONATE and fulfilled lives

Asian Woman

focus

Newsletter packed with ideas, latest research, tools & techniques

specially geared to supporting Asian women excel in their

career, relationships, family and in celebrating their own individuality.

In this issue:

¨ Feature article 1: How different could your life be if you had more confidence?

¨ Feature article 2: How to actively market yourself?

¨ Extended free coaching offer

Please forward this newsletter to anyone you think may find it valuable.

Subscribe here

How different could your life be if you had more confidence?

So what is confidence?

Self confidence and self esteem are linked. However, they are also different. Self confidence is how we think and feel about what we are, or are not able to do. Self esteem is how we think and feel about who we are and our sense of self worth—feeling valuable and liking ourselves. Both are vital for our success and happiness.

When we have high self esteem, we are accurately aware of our strengths and weaknesses. We welcome negative feedback from others as we see it as a growth opportunity rather than feeling threatened or upset by it.

Some poor self esteem behaviours:

¨ always putting others first

¨ finding it hard to accept compliments

¨ not asking for what we need

¨ not trusting our own opinion

¨ having low expectations either for our personal or professional life

Grow your confidence

Develop your self esteem by:

¨ fully accepting compliments—don’t brush them off; just say ‘thank you’

¨ stop needing others’ approval so much; trusting your own choices

¨ taking time out to care for yourself and do the things you enjoy

¨ not blaming others for how you feel; taking full responsibility for your own
feelings

To improve self confidence, make sure you:

¨ engage in positive self talk about your abilities

¨ notice what you are doing well rather than what is not good

¨ praise yourself when you do something well

¨ focus on what you are good at and not where you need development

Believe in yourself, even when you think you are not good at something. If you believe you are confident you will act more confidently; heard of the term fake it ‘til you make it - it works, practice it!

What could you achieve if you were even more confident? Write it down now while it is fresh in your mind.

My challenge to you is to pick one bullet point from the list above, ‘Grow your Confidence’, and practice that in an area that you finding challenging - practice it for at least the next 5 days. Let me know how you get on.

How to Actively Market Your Value!

If you’re not taking responsibility for your own personal brand,

then who is?

We all have a personal brand whether we like it or not. With every interaction, meeting or presentation we go to, people will subconsciously be making judgements about us. A lot of Asian woman professionals find it extremely hard to self-promote as it goes against the grain of how they were bought up. ‘Don’t sing your praises, just get on with the task at hand’ we were told. However, today’s competitive business world demands us to be proactive and know how we stand out from the crowd.

Big companies understand the importance of brands. Today, in the Age of the Individual, you have to be your own brand. Our most important job is to be head marketer for the brand called You Tom Peters

" If people don’t know who you are and your abilities, they can’t consider you for new opportunities or reward you for your contribution. No one can do it for you. If others start bringing up your name, it’s because you have made yourself known. This is where your good girl alert might be going off, saying “I don’t like talking about myself! That’s bragging and distasteful”. Well I’m here to say it’s not. There’s nothing big headed about stating what is true about you, your abilities and your accomplishments, it’s all in the way you say it".

Mary Foley, Bodacious Career

You have to stop thinking of yourself as an employee and start thinking of yourself as the CEO of a company - and that company is ME Ltd. How might you now market yourself differently. If you don't communicate your value in business terms, you would very soon go out of business and have no income. Astoundingly, when I ask some of my clients to quickly jot down 10 strengths, they struggle or they write something down but don’t really believe it; if you aren't clear about what makes you special and unique then how can you ever communicate it and if you don’t communicate it, key decision makers are not going to realise how good you really are and you are going to get overlooked and be under valued.

So what makes you different?

Start now, get a piece of paper

1. Write down 10 things you are proud of having achieved in the last 6 months. What did you do that made you stand out? What difference did that make in business terms?

2. Write down 10 characteristics that enabled you to achieve those things, Were you persistent and reliable? Did you anticipate and solve problems before they became chaotic? What does this brand called You offer?

3. What 5 things can you do to add value to your brand?

If you find it hard to begin with, stick at it, because you need to train your brain to start thinking in terms of what makes you great now and what will make you even more valuable in the future?

If you do not actively and consistently market yourself, you are doing yourself a huge disservice because only you can promote your brand!

So get busy, get visible, go speak to new people, write an article, speak at an event—do whatever feels right for you!

Back by popular demand!

Email us now for your

FREE 45 minute coaching

Session

To take advantage of this offer, simply reply to the email with the subject "Free coaching session"

and a number for us to contact you on.

Questions or comments? Email us at sukhy@asianwomanfocus.com or call 0791 702 4214

To remove your name from our mailing list please click here

Many Asian women struggle with confidence - not all, but a large percentage do. This is largely dependent on upbringing and cultural differences. Some have learnt to portray a confident persona but internally are not confident with who they are. They struggle with displaying assertive behaviour and asking for what they need; they find they end up sitting on the fence because they are worried about offending others so what we get are hugely competent and conscientious women not contributing all that they could because they don’t have the confidence to do so.

I’ve coached a number of people who, at even very senior levels, admit that they wish they were more confident. How we feel about ourselves determines how seriously other people take us; when we start to see ourselves as more worthy, we start performing at even higher levels and achieving even more success, not just in our careers but in our personal lives too!

So where are you selling yourself short?

Which specific areas of your professional or personal life would you like to feel better about yourself?

Good news is that with a bit of knowledge and a bit of practice, being confident is something you can master in all areas of your life, allowing you to enjoy being the best version of yourself!

Author: Sukhy Bains