HBR IdeaCast
Best of IdeaCast: Escape Your Comfort Zone
Tue Jul 04 2023Description
The episode discusses the challenges of building a business and the importance of stepping outside your comfort zone. It explores the concept of anti-expertise and provides examples of activities that require stepping outside one's comfort zone. The episode also highlights the common experience of feeling like an imposter and suggests customizing behavior as a strategy to overcome this. It delves into techniques for managing anxiety and finding motivation to step outside one's comfort zone. Lastly, it offers insights on supporting others in their journey of stepping outside their comfort zone.
Insights
Stepping outside your comfort zone is essential for personal and professional growth
Building a business and achieving expertise require pushing beyond comfort zones. Breakthroughs happen when we challenge ourselves.
Feeling like an imposter is common, even among successful individuals
Even accomplished people like Natalie Portman and Cheryl Sandberg experience imposter syndrome. Customizing behavior can help overcome this feeling.
Customizing behavior can facilitate stepping outside your comfort zone
Scripting conversations, using props, and making small adjustments to behavior can make challenging situations more manageable.
Finding motivation to step outside your comfort zone
Having multiple sources of conviction, such as respect, skill development, career advancement, self-esteem, or helping others, can provide the necessary motivation.
Supporting others in stepping outside their comfort zone
Understanding psychological roadblocks, addressing avoidance behaviors, and providing encouragement are key in helping others grow.
Trying new things can lead to positive discoveries
Stepping outside your comfort zone often reveals that things are not as bad as feared or that you are better than expected.
Recognize past successes and build resilience
Reflecting on past achievements and realizing one's bravery and capabilities can boost confidence in stepping outside the comfort zone. Building resilience comes from feeling in control and having a sense of power.
Chapters
- Building a Business and Stepping Outside Your Comfort Zone
- Customizing Behavior to Step Outside Your Comfort Zone
- Overcoming Anxiety and Finding Motivation
- Supporting Others in Stepping Outside Their Comfort Zone
Building a Business and Stepping Outside Your Comfort Zone
00:01 - 07:20
- Building a business is hard.
- Expertise is grounded in comfort and being good at something.
- Breakthroughs happen outside of your comfort zone.
- Andy Malinsky studied anti-expertise and wrote the book REACH.
- Ask yourself if you would be excited to do something without anxiety.
- Examples of stepping outside your comfort zone include networking, public speaking, delivering bad news, performing layoffs, evicting people, performing painful procedures on children, delivering last rites, pitching ideas as a small business owner, and selling products as a goat farmer.
- Authenticity can be a barrier to stepping outside your comfort zone.
- The competence challenge is related to feeling like an imposter or fearing incompetence in new roles or tasks.
Customizing Behavior to Step Outside Your Comfort Zone
06:58 - 13:35
- Feeling like an imposter is common, even among successful people like Natalie Portman and Cheryl Sandberg.
- Customizing your behavior can help you step outside your comfort zone.
- Examples of customization include scripting out networking conversations, wearing a power suit for confidence, bringing a friend to large events, changing public speaking to a Q&A session, and using props as conversation starters.
- Bringing a selfie stick to social situations can be an effective conversation starter.
Overcoming Anxiety and Finding Motivation
13:06 - 19:36
- Using a selfie stick can help shy individuals initiate conversations and social interactions
- Personal items with sentimental value, like a ring or bracelet, can provide courage and confidence in challenging situations
- Finding a psychological middle ground between extreme thoughts can bring clarity and ease anxiety in uncomfortable situations
- Having multiple sources of conviction, such as respect, skill development, career advancement, self-esteem, or helping others, can motivate stepping outside of comfort zones
Supporting Others in Stepping Outside Their Comfort Zone
19:24 - 24:24
- Helping someone grow outside their comfort zone requires understanding their psychological roadblocks
- Identify the specific reasons for anxiety or discomfort
- Support individuals in recognizing and addressing their avoidance behaviors
- Use the framework of conviction, customization, and clarity to help them try new things
- Encourage and motivate individuals to step outside their comfort zone
- Trying new things can lead to discoveries that it's not as bad as feared or that one is better than expected
- Realize past successes and remember that you are braver and more capable than you think
- Building resilience comes from feeling in control and having a sense of power