How to build the confidence to succeed in aesthetic practice

Do you find yourself asking, how can I become confident in X? And ‘X’ could be a new injection procedure, a consultation tip, talking about complications, or explaining something to patients; that part does not matter because most of us are looking for confidence in something. After all, when you do not have confidence, you feel like you are out of your comfort zone, and it can be frightening. Confidence is not something you have before you execute something; if you feel like you are lacking confidence, the way out is not to wait for confidence to arrive because you will be stuck forever.

In this blog, Dr Tim Pearce explains how to get out of your own way and build the confidence to succeed in aesthetic practice, how to avoid overconfidence, setbacks, and emotional rollercoasters, and why being authentic can improve confidence.

What is the formula for finding confidence?

Dr Tim has discovered a four-part formula for finding confidence shared by the business entrepreneur Dan Sullivan, The Strategic Coach, who advocates the 4 Cs. If you are stuck finding your confidence, this might help.

Everything you do takes a commitment – to develop a new skill or build a business; most people have a rough idea but are not fully committed. When you are committed to ‘doing a thing’, you feel different, and you are prepared to confront uncertainty.

For example, if you want to have a business, if you want to free yourself from working in the NHS, perhaps, then, you can no longer dabble, you must be fully committed to getting out and into aesthetic practice, which means doing all the hard stuff along the way, empathises Dr Tim.

Step one in developing confidence is to reach the stage of commitment which means you are no longer entertaining all the other possibilities; you are committing to one.

After commitment, you need to have some courage. Many clinicians who lack confidence do not dare to move forward, but courage comes before confidence. Many believe confidence is a good feeling, but that is also a misunderstanding. Courage is an uncomfortable, unpleasant feeling of being out of your depth but doing something anyway. Knowing that is part of the process will help you make the right step; feeling uncomfortable, and suffering from imposter syndrome, is a sign of growth.

Once you develop courage, you soon start to realise that you are capable and will develop competence. The more you ‘have the courage’ to do something (that you have trained to do), the more learning you will get from its execution, and then you get good feedback and become competent.

Putting all these things together, and going through the uncomfortable stuff, ultimately gets you the pay-off of confidence. Confidence comes when you are brave and committed to taking a courageous step to develop your sense of competence; then you just keep repeating it.

Read up on mistakes clinicians make when starting an aesthetic business.

How can the Dunning-Kruger effect impact confidence?

Some individuals initially overestimate their skills (and competence) after completing training, feeling overly confident and ready to excel, known as the Dunning-Kruger effect.

However, as more real-world situations occur, it can soon dawn on them that they lack experience and competence and thus, they start to lack confidence, ending up feeling discouraged, and back to square one. This is a critical point where some will give up while others will persevere and grow.

Well-presented or glamourous on-stage training can often manifest this problem, making things appear easy until you try them yourself, resulting in a feeling of deflation.

Conversely, and perhaps worse when you try something you have learnt and it goes well the first couple of times, and you feel invincible, your confidence soars. This can lead to thinking you have mastered it until you try it on the wrong patient and get a bad result. Dr Tim refers to this as a ‘coming home’ moment that grounds you again, bringing you back down to earth where you can start to grow your confidence at a steadier pace.

How do you cope with successes and setbacks?

Achieving confidence (and business success) is a journey, and it is important to realise that there will be highs (the euphoria of success) and lows (where you will feel disillusioned).

It will be an emotional rollercoaster of successes (feeling like you are taking over the world) and losses (where you are ready to give up and quit), but you should be focusing on neither, warns Dr Tim.

The highs/successes and lows/setbacks are temporary illusions, rather than a true reflection of your business journey, noise, if you will. His advice is to be consistent and methodically keep going, and you will gradually and steadily improve, rather than being swayed by the emotional rollercoaster.

Being authentic can improve your confidence

Clinicians looking to leap into aesthetic practice sometimes lack the confidence to start because they perceive a need to conform to an expectation of ‘type’ to practice successfully in aesthetics, to look a certain way themselves, for example.

Yet, Dr Tim explains that true expertise and confidence come from authenticity. You must get in touch with what your patients need from you – helping them, solving their problems, offering valuable insight – and not what you think they want from you – be it a certain age, or certain gender, or to fit a particular image.

If you are authentic, can explain things to your patients, be honest, and have the competence to deliver the treatments safely and with good results, you will gain their trust, and increase your confidence. If you are naturally introverted, (like Dr Tim), it can help to focus on being of service, knowing that you are answering questions and communicating with an audience that is drawn to you (because they trust you).

Like most things, building confidence is a learning curve of professional development, understanding your personality, being authentic, persevering, and building competence and trust will all lead to confidence in your abilities and expertise.

Dr Tim has a whole series of business-building blogs for you to enjoy. Why not read his most recent ones on building a strategy for leaving healthcare for full-time aesthetic practice and the clinical path to being a successful medical aesthetic practitioner.

If you have any business questions, ideas for future podcasts or community discussions, you can also find Dr Tim Pearce on Instagram.

Dr Tim Pearce eLearning

Dr Tim Pearce MBChB BSc (Hons) MRCGP founded his eLearning concept in 2016 in order to provide readily accessible BOTOX® and dermal filler online courses for fellow Medical Aesthetics practitioners. His objective was to raise standards within the industry – a principle which remains just as relevant today.

Our exclusive video-led courses are designed to build confidence, knowledge and technique at every stage, working from foundation level to advanced treatments and management of complications.

Thousands of delegates have benefited from the courses and we’re highly rated on Trustpilot. For more information or to discuss which course is right for you, please get in touch with our friendly team.