19 Sep [Part 2 of 3] Self-Doubt to Success: Fostering Competence in Teams
Have you ever found yourself questioning your abilities at work, unsure if you’re truly capable of making a difference? Or perhaps you’ve witnessed a colleague struggling with self-doubt, hesitating to take on new challenges. These moments of uncertainty highlight a crucial topic for this week’s blog: competence. While a sense of belonging is foundational, feeling capable and effective in your role is equally essential. In this installment, we’ll look at how competence shapes individual and team success, continuing our exploration of the Self-Determination Theory.
Competence in the Workplace
Competence, according to Self-Determination Theory, is the need to feel effective in your interactions and to have opportunities to demonstrate your skills (Deci & Ryan, 2000). In the workplace, this means more than just knowing how to do your job; it’s about feeling confident in your abilities, recognising the impact of your work, and continuously developing your skills. When employees feel competent, they are not only more motivated but also perform at higher levels, contributing to a resilient and innovative team environment.
Consider a project where you’re encouraged to use your strengths, you receive clear and regular feedback and see the results of your work. You’re likely to approach each task with enthusiasm, tackle challenges head-on, and propose new ideas, its energising! Research supports this: Baard, Deci, and Ryan (2004) found that employees who feel competent are more inclined to take on challenging tasks, driving both individual and team performance. This sense of capability fuels intrinsic motivation, enhancing engagement and job satisfaction (Gagné & Deci, 2005). Competent team members become valuable problem solvers, suggesting creative solutions that can elevate the team’s effectiveness. Moreover, competence helps teams adapt, recover from setbacks, and maintain momentum even in the face of adversity.
Cultivating Competence in Your Team
1. Provide clear expectations and feedback: Ensure team members understand their roles and responsibilities, and provide regular, constructive feedback. Many delegates in our programs share their surprise during their annual performance reviews, where they receive unexpected feedback they never heard throughout the year. These missed opportunities could have been avoided with timely guidance, helping individuals improve and meet expectations long before performance reviews.
2. Invest in Training and Development: Offer opportunities for skill enhancement and professional growth, including workshops, mentoring, or access to online learning platforms. While technical skills are often the focus, many roles require interpersonal skills that do not come naturally to everyone. It’s common for technical specialists to be promoted into leadership roles without the necessary skills to lead effectively. Programs like LeaderShift are designed specifically to address this gap, helping emerging leaders make the mindset shift from being individual contributors to leading others.
3. Challenge and support: Assign tasks that stretch team members’ abilities while providing the necessary support and resources. A well-designed challenge allows people to leave the role knowing more than they did when they started.
4. Celebrate learning and growth: Recognise both achievements and the ongoing efforts to learn and improve, not just the end results. Celebrating learning fosters a culture of continuous growth, where competence is seen as something that can be developed rather than a fixed trait. Encouraging team members to share their knowledge and experiences helps create a supportive environment where everyone feels empowered to contribute and learn from one another.
5. Align roles to strengths: Knowing and understanding your people—taking the time to have conversations about their skills and interests allows you to align responsibilities with their strengths. This not only enhances individual performance but also enables team members to feel more competent and fulfilled in their contributions, ultimately building a cohesive high-performing team.
It is important to note that competence doesn’t exist in isolation, it’s connected with the sense of belonging we discussed previously. When team members feel both competent and connected, they are more likely to share knowledge and skills openly, seek and offer help without fear of judgment, collaborate effectively on projects, and take calculated risks that can lead to innovation.
As we’ve discussed, cultivating a sense of competence is critical for building high-performing teams. It empowers individuals to contribute their best work and drives collective success. In our final installment of this series, we’ll explore the third pillar of Self-Determination Theory: autonomy. We’ll discuss how giving team members a sense of choice and self-direction can further enhance team effectiveness and individual well-being.
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Written by: Mbali Masinga