Do you feel like a fraud? Amazingly, most successful entrepreneurs do!
Fifty, 150, 500? I can’t even count the number of highly successful entrepreneurs, sales professionals and executives who’ve told me, “I feel like a fraud,” or something similar — and all these talented people had a secret. Like one very powerful businessman, whom I’ll call Dan.
The fear of public speaking.
Dan was a public figure who use to enjoy speaking, but was becoming terrified of it. The greater his success, the more he felt like a fraud, which caused his fear of public speaking. Dan’s secret was that he’d dropped out of the eighth grade, gotten a GED and never attended college. Now he was in business dealing with Harvard MBAs and some of the most brilliant business minds in the country.
What if they found out he was an eighth grade dropout? To overcome this fear, Dan decided on two courses of action. One, I’ll share now — the other, in my next post.
Dan decided to reveal his life story in the business section of his city’s paper. The story was about an incredibly brave, tough, intelligent kid who survived at a young age on the streets of a ghetto where many die. He became a highly ranked karate fighter and an articulate, voracious reader, educating himself through amazing desire and self-discipline. He eventually built several successful businesses and was a master at putting together multimillion dollar deals with some of the most financially savvy business people in the country.
His published story created admiration for him throughout the business community, and he no longer had any secrets. Dan exposed everything in the story, and by doing so, released most of his fear and resolved a lifetime of feeling shame.
The truth set him free.
Not long after this, Dan was invited to be a guest on Nightline, where he handled the interview with grace. He’d turned his fear into excitement and had more confidence than ever.
