The Importance Of Overconfidence

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Introduction
When a company goes through the rigorous process of hiring and interviewing qualified individuals the idea is to select those who will fit the job description and the company culture. In other words, it is best to pick someone who is confident. Confidence demonstrates the possibility of a competitive edge, the ability to grow within the company, and minimal room for failure. It is also easier to gain respect from coworkers with confidence, especially for those in management positions. Nonetheless, there is a fine line where confidence becomes overconfidence. Overconfidence transforms itself from an advantage to a burden rather quickly. When an individual is overconfident it affects the work environment, and how an organization …show more content…

From the Holt’s Type Tests, there are a plethora of personality types that may have characteristics that can attribute to overconfidence. The methods I selected for the research were chosen to ensure the exploration of emotions, environment, and personalities are taken into account. My goal for this paper is to analyze and research the issues with overconfidence within organizational behavior and to state where the behavior trait originates.
Research Questions
To guide my search I compiled three key questions:
1. What are the risks of having overconfident employees in any organization?
2. How can an organization’s leadership approach overconfident employees without hurting their self-esteem?
3. Where does overconfidence stem from? Is it bred in the organization or can be identified during an interview process?
Question …show more content…

Employees and leaders who recognize an individual that is hurting the company by being overconfident can utilize a few tactics to put a stop to the person. The first is conducting a “pre-mortem” questionnaire, where others ask the individual to state their best guess and then list reasons why the idea or belief may not work (Camilleri, 2017). This reduces their confidence as they must express out loud multiple cases for failure and contradict their original opinion. I personally believe this a perfect strategy as it is professional and allows everyone to explore multiple possibilities. For example, consider hat occurred at the American Red Cross if we had implemented this tactic it might have allowed my supervisor to let the idea go or create a similar one with less extravagance. I could have asked her to list the arguments that contradict her belief that her dinner would unite the community and generate donors from the nearby area. It would have been realizations she made on her own instead of being told by others that it will not work. According to Reasons for Confidence Report & Research, it is proven that overconfidence is reduced by utilizing this tactic (Koriat, Lichtenstein & Fischhoff, 1980). The method is decent as it does not hurt anyone’s self-esteem and calls for the need to look at the “blind spots”. I do see how the overly confident individual might feel attacked by being asked to make

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