Last autumn, my supervisor invited folks at my workplace to participate in a personality assessment called DISC, which is an acronym for the four personalities it represents: dominance, influence, steadiness, and conscientiousness. My assessment results placed me solidly in the conscientiousness category. The bottom line is that I am most comfortable when I can work within existing circumstances to ensure quality and accuracy – I am a perfectionist.
While this personality type has many beneficial qualities, it also means that I tend to avoid risk and live in my comfort zone. That can be limiting, and because I am aware of the weakness, I MUST constantly strive to stretch myself and take on roles outside of my comfort zone. Often my richest and most rewarding life experiences come from time spent outside that comfort zone.
If this rings true for you as well, here are two recommendations to help your next Toastmasters trip outside the comfort zone come easier.
Align yourself with an accomplished mentor who can help you overcome weaknesses
I was immediately assigned a mentor when I joined Afterburners and it gave me a critical boost of confidence. My mentor—Jodie—wasted no time in prompting me to volunteer for club roles and begin working on my next speech. Most importantly, she told me to always have a speech in my figurative pocket.
For someone like me, whose tendency is to approach new situations slowly and methodically, figuring everything out before I make a move, Jodie’s gentle insistence that I take on roles sooner rather than later was just the encouragement that I needed. This paid off recently when my travel arrangements changed and allowed me to attend a meeting where I was not on the schedule, and bad weather kept one of our scheduled speakers from attending. The Toastmaster of the day asked if I could fill in, and thanks to Jodie’s advice, I had a speech in my pocket. I gave my speech and as usual, when it was over, realized that leaving my comfort zone was worth it yet again. If you know you have a particular weakness, then align yourself with a mentor who can help you overcome it and flourish.
Choose a club with (or establish in your club) a system for encouraging leadership positions
It has also been my tendency to avoid taking on leadership roles before I understood the parameters, framework, or hierarchy into which I would be moving. Fortunately, Afterburners is a club endowed with experienced Toastmasters who genuinely care about growing and developing new leaders. Instead of waiting until I understood everything before volunteering for a club officer role, the current officers of the club encouraged even the newest members to take on leadership roles – not because they are qualified to do them, but so that they can learn and become qualified in each topic area.
A few weeks ago, the outgoing VP Education for this term called me to ask if I would be interested in serving as VP Education next term. My initial reaction was, “Oh my gosh, I’m not ready!” But I recognized this habitual response as a weakness, and confronted it by saying yes. Again, I find myself being stretched outside my comfort zone as I learn about and prepare to take on this new role. But with practice, even that space outside your comfort zone becomes familiar and you learn to respond to and overcome your weakness.
Go forth and begin life outside your comfort zone.
