28 | The simple technique to reduce overwhelm when applying for an opportunity

If you listened to last week's episode, you'll remember that we are on season two of UnRuley Leadership. And season two is all about the sensitive professional. 

So whether you identify as introverted as an empath, as a highly sensitive person, an HSP - this season is for you.

And one tricky area that I see coming up a lot for sensitive professionals is that we can very easily get into our own heads about what other people think.

This creates a lot of overwhelm and one really specific area where I've worked with people on, is the process of applying for a position or a leadership development program.

It happens because you're essentially asking someone to judge whether or not to put you in that program, which in our mind then becomes this whole thing around judgment.

We worry about whether we are good enough. Whether the other person thinks we're good enough. What they'll think about as applying.

And we're especially trying to navigate the balancing act of putting ourselves out there, promoting ourselves without seeming like we're bragging or that we're not being humble enough.

I want to let you know, first of all, that, if you've experienced any of that, It's a perfectly natural. It's actually quite natural beyond folks who identify as highly sensitive, but especially if you're highly sensitive, this is so completely natural that this would be coming up for you.

So what I'm giving you in this week's episode is a super simple way to get out of your head and get to a place where it's really easy to prepare for interviews, prepare for applications to leadership programs or anything else really where you're having to put yourself out there.

xo
Liz

PS Make sure you're on the wait list for the Self-Advocacy Made Easy Summit!

Well, hello there friend. Happy Monday. If it is Monday for you or it happy whatever day it happens to be that you're listening to this. So, if you listen to last week's episode, you know, you'll remember that we are on season two. And season two is all about the sensitive professional. So whether you identify as introverted as an empath, as a highly sensitive person, an HSP.

This season is for you. And as a reminder, we are hosting a summit. It is only weeks away. It is about four weeks away. I believe. And I really want to see you there, so make sure you don't miss registration. Get over on to the wait list for the summit. The summit is called. Self-advocacy made easy.

And it is for the sensitive professional who dreams of rising up into that director level, role or beyond. So I want to see you there. The summit will be October 10th to 12th. And you can get on the wait list over@themintambition.com slash summit. Or if you happen to be listening to this in a couple of weeks from now, you'll be able to get right onto the registration because registration will be open then.

Okay. So, like I said, this season is for the cells that have professional. And one area, one tricky area that I see coming up a lot for sensitive professionals. Is that we, we can very easily get kind of get into our own heads about things, about what other people think. And it creates a lot of overwhelm and one really specific area where I've seen this and I've worked with people on, is the application process of applying for a position, especially a promotion.

As well as applying for leadership development programs, this, this comes up more often than we think. So, first of all, if this has happened for you, please know that you are not alone. This is actually really common and it's like, we are making ourselves vulnerable when we apply for these programs, we're putting ourselves out there saying I would like to, to, uh, receive this development experience.

And you're essentially asking someone to judge whether or not to put you in that program, which in our mind then becomes this whole thing around judgment. And we worry about whether we are good enough. Whether the other person thinks we're good enough. What they'll think about as applying. And for a lot of us even like, how do we navigate that balancing act of putting ourselves out there, promoting ourselves without seeming like we're bragging or that we're not being humble enough?

So I just want to let you know, first of all, that, if you've experienced any of that, It's a perfectly natural. Especially for the sensitive professional, it's actually quite natural beyond folks who identify as highly sensitive. But especially if you're highly sensitive, this is so completely natural that this would be coming up for you.

Okay. So what I'm going to be giving you is a super simple way to essentially get out of your head and get to a place where it's really easy to prepare for interviews, prepare for applications to leadership programs or anything else really where you're having to put yourself out there. You're feeling like you're putting yourself out there feeling like you're exposed.

And I want to make it really simple for you. And I want to help give you a really quick little tool. That's going to remove all of that. So let's get to it. And I'm going to give you that tool. Well, Hey there, I'm Liz St. Jean, and this is the unruly leadership podcast where I help subject matter experts. Like you design a career on your terms. It's where strategy meets intuition to help you break the rules, ignore the rules and make your own damn rules. So let's break free from perfectionism, imposter thoughts, and that inner rule.

Keep that's keeping you in your career comfort zone. it's time to become unapologetically you and step into the life you were meant to live. We're going to talk presence, productivity career, and having it all. Or as my four year old would say, we're going to take over the world. So let's get to it.

All right. So as I was saying, we are going to be talking about a super simple tool. To be able to get you out of your head when you're going through any kind of application process. So whether it's an application for a promotion or a leadership. Development program or anything else where you are feeling like you need to put yourself out there and you're highlighting your accomplishments and it feels really uncomfortable. And you're noticing that you're getting in your own head.

And the reason I'm doing this is well, a few different reasons. But one specifically was that I had a, we had a client session on this a couple of weeks ago, and we were working through applying for a leadership development program and working through all the stuff that came up. And it got me reflecting too on some of my past experiences.

And I was thinking back and thinking back, especially to one experience in particular. Where I just, I, I had a really hard time putting my application together and I really was getting in my head. And part of it was because I couldn't stop this internal, like ping pong, narrative going back and forth.

Feeling like on the one hand that no, I obviously can do that as feeling confident, feeling strong and then ping-ponging, or yo-yoing back over to the other side Of the, just the, almost like. Dread, almost the idea of someone else looking at my application. What if they don't think I'm good enough? What, you know, are they going to be sitting there saying to themselves, like who, who is this person to be applying.

Can you imagine if you're it raise your hand, if you've ever had that in your mind's eye, imagining other people with that, like, I dunno, is it a frown or like that phase of like, oh, why is this person applying? No, it just really brought me back to that place for me, years and years ago. And I realized that I had inadvertently created a tool.

That just kind of like gets you out of that. And I really wanted to share it with you. I shared it with my client and it's. Such a simple, great, simple tool. And I promise we are getting to the tool. So the, the reason this tool works, I'm just gonna explain a little bit about why it works and I'll tell you what it is is that we want to get out of our heads. And by doing

Um, to do that. What we want to do is make this process a more neutral. And make it more analytical. Okay. Which is kind of counterintuitive, right? Like you'd think, well, if I'm already in my head, I probably want to get out of my head. Don't I. It's like, well, we just want to shift how we're approaching this type of task.

So in this case, your task is to highlight your accomplishments and demonstrate that you are a fantastic and the best candidate for. The promotion or the opportunity or whatever it is you're going for. So. One of the things you want to do, and you probably already know this, but I'll likely do some future sessions on this. Maybe bring in some guests, experts.

Is that when you are highlighting your accomplishments and you are highlighting yourself to up to You want to do it through storytelling? Right. You want to use stories? And you may have come across this before, but if, if not, if this is actually an area that you find. You would find very helpful.

Let me know if I, me in a DM, Instagram, LinkedIn, wherever, and let me know, because I've got several colleagues who are experts in this and I can bring them onto the podcast. So come by me and let So you want to have stories? The thing is, is that you want stories that are going to match your skills and competencies, and you probably already know this. It's just that we kind of like get into our heads about whether or not something matches.

Is it good enough? Which is the right story. Am I good enough? And like, we just becomes overwhelming. Like we become overwhelmed or flooded. Our bodies are flooded or our minds are flooded with thoughts. Our bodies are flooded with emotions. And just gets all of the, the fight flight freeze response going.

So to get out of that, we want to make it neutral. We want to make it analytical in terms of matching what's the strongest, uh, story to match to the competency and to use in your application or to use in your interview process. So. The super simple solution. It's basically a grid. It's a grid. So either in Excel or Google sheets, I recommend you can't even do it in, in word, but I really recommend using it in Excel or Google sheets. And you're going to create a super simple grid.

Where every row. Is a story. Is a story about an accomplishment and a story about results that you created. And every column is a competency. Now you can, you can create a master list of this, but I actually highly recommend doing this from. You know, quote from scratch, but it remember is super simple. So it's not going to take you long.

I'm doing it from scratch for every new position and every new leadership development program or anything else you're applying to doing it from scratch. The reason you're going to go for scratches for, At least two reasons who will see the third comes up as I'm talking. Um, reason number one is that it gets you used to.

Uh, thinking and talking about your accomplishments in the context of skills and competencies. So every time you do it, you are basically laying down a tracking your brain to that story in an analytical way. Because you can, you can just do once and have a master one and work off of that, but that doesn't help you prepare.

You do this every time. And especially if you are in the, um, Uh, what I call the, the, uh, winter season of your career, where you're leaving your past position and you're applying for a new position you're in winter season, you are probably applying to lots of different positions. So this for you is a fantastic exercise to help lay down that track in your brain of these stories.

So that when you're in an interview experience, they just come to you so naturally and so easily. So that's reason number one for doing it every time. Reason number two for doing every time is. I'm sure you've heard this advice before, but just like your You should always tailor To what you're applying for.

Right. So this is very much linked to you and to your resume, but especially the interviews, like you want it to be specific to that IX, um, opportunity. Okay. So highly recommend doing it from scratch every time. Obviously, if you are really short for time and you've got this opportunity. You can always pull up an old one and have a look at it as a refresher.

But just, uh, don't let that become a, uh, an excuse for not doing it from scratch. Um, as much as you can. So you want to do it from scratch. You're creating columns for competencies or skills. Rose for stories. And then there's two variations just depending on how super simple you want it to be now.

The super simplest of them all is all you do is you go down your row of stories and you put an X for every skill and competency that it matches it is. Do it. Nice and simple. Just go down. And then you have this master list and you can just see at a glance, which story. Is a really good one, right? Because here's the other thing. A lot of times our skills and competencies kind of transcend stories and a story will have multiple skills and competencies.

So you can use this in two ways. If you, if you're applying to something and you know that they're looking for a very specific competency, like you, you know, who's doing the interviewing process or who's reviewing the document. You, you know, what matters to them in terms of a competency? You know, you might look for a story. You're gonna look for story where there's a strong match there.

That said that competency probably has lots of matches. Right? So have a look as well. If let's say, let's say there's four different stories that you think are really good match. Well, let's have a look too to see which other competencies, those stories match. And this is where you can, you get out of your, kind of emotional head, so to speak and you can analyze, you can get analytical and you're getting it out of you and onto paper into a grid that.

Tell me a great isn't analytical, right? Super analytical. So that's helping making it more neutral. So you're looking at those three stories and you might observe, like, watch yourself, watch for this. There might've been a story you realize you've been telling, but that story only hits me a couple of competencies.

Versus you might have another story that in some ways doesn't feel as strong, but you realize it hits a lots of competencies. Well, depending what you're going for it, that might be a better story. But on the flip side, like I was saying, if you know, something is very important to the position or to the person who's making the decision and determining who to put in that position.

You might choose another story that really only has, like, it is only a major showcase of a specific competency, right? And this is where you can get more analytical and you can make some, make some decisions, Make educated decisions and it's going to be informed and educated, but realize too, this is also the reason that.

Um, And the, you know, the, the phrasing, you don't put your eggs in one basket. This is also why, especially if you're in winter season, you don't want to put all of your kind of emotions, hopes and dreams into one specific one single opportunity, right? Look for multiple opportunities because. A you'll get to learn from them. You'll get to, you can, you can try different stories and different situations and see which ones are landing better.

And also it means that. If like, let's say you chose a story that seemed to be a great fit and may have been a great fit for a different hiring But maybe, maybe the person you're talking to, doesn't see it the same way. Well, th that can happen and it has nothing to do with you has nothing to do with your story and it not being a good story.

It just has to do with the match between what you're sharing and the person hearing it, and whether the person makes the same evaluation as you now. This is also where we can get analytical. Like if you're noticing that you're using certain stories and they don't seem to be resonating well, this is again being kind of being neutral, being analytical. You can look and say,

Well, maybe the story isn't landing, and this is where, A little side bonus tip. Even though I know this might cause some anxiety for some listeners. Um, this is where talking to a trusted mentor. A colleague appear someone else who is in a space where you can get comfortable with them and you can trust them, share the story. You can get some feedback about whether or not that story is landing is resonating does seem to be a solid, really great example of that skill or competency.

So that was a super simple It was like a super, super simple version with just Xs. Um, As an aside, every time I hear Xs and. I, when I was writing out my notes for this, I was right now in Xs. I just had to smile. Like I had to tell you this story. Um, so my kiddo, if you, if you know, or if you remember.

I have a young, young kiddo. And he loves to Tic TAC toe and we'll play tic-tac-toe. But he calls of X's and O's is. Sorry, mom moment. I just thought that was so cute. Xs and noses. So as I was doing my notes, I had that in the back of my mind. Oh, I'm doing X's and O's is. Okay. All right. Okay. So that was a super, super simple version. Just exes.

The next level version, if you really want to get analytical. And especially if you're like me and I total geek for spreadsheets, you can throw conditional formatting into this, which is a whole other fun level of things. Is when it, Um, instead of just putting Xs, what you can do is you can actually rank how strong you feel that story matches a competency.

And this, I would keep simple. I would just do a 1, 2, 3 ranking. Don't make it. Don't overcomplicate this either. Don't go like into, over analytical mode. Just keep it simple, but this is like, if you feel like you've got the. The space to get a little bit beyond Xs. We can do a ranking. So 1, 2, 3, however you want to do it. For example.

W, uh, one is, you know, the store, the competency. Is, you know, it's sort of reflected in the story, but not that strong, um, too, is that okay? This is a pretty decent story for that competency. And three is like, oh, this is a phenomenal story for this competency. And then he can get into some fun stuff with conditional formatting and even at a glance, then you'll have an even better sense of which story.

Is really good to bring forward because it'll match multiple competencies in different ways. But like I said, you do not need to over complicated. That makes it, that makes it more like a simple solution. The Xs are the super simple solution. So, like I said, what you want to do is create this grid. You have columns for competencies, you have rows for stories, and then you throw in Xs. Or if you want to get next level, you can rank them as 1, 2, 3.

And it's really that simple, like just that simple helps you get out of your head. In to do it every time. Like I said, every time from scratch, do it, do it over and over because that's also going to help you. It's going to help, help you or retain, and remember these stories, help you think through them. And again, help you kind of get out of that place where

Feeling really, um, Emotionally flooded about the experience of putting ourselves out there. So let's make it a little bit more neutral. Let's make it a little bit more analytical. And if you want more actionable advice about advancing your career as a sensitive professional. Like I said at the beginning we have the summit coming

It's about four or five weeks away. If you're listening to this episode as it's broadcasting. I would love to see you there. So get on the wait list and that way, you know, for sure you won't miss when it's open. Uh, the waitlist is themintambition.com/summit. It's a summit specifically designed for highly sensitive professionals and professionals who want to rise, who have dreams who want to make impact.

Right. I know I've talked to so many of you. I know you want to have a meaningful career making impact, having a, a positive effect on the world, around you. So come on over to the summit. I can't wait to see you there. And for now, Have a wonderful rest of your week and i'll talk to you next week bye-bye

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