Day 20: You are not alone

Some of the tips we have covered so far have talked about involving other people in your goal.    (See Tips 5 & 11).  It is almost inevitable that other people will comment on what you are doing and for the most part, you will find them helpful and encouraging.  So today we are looking in more detail at the type of support you can get.  Our tip for today is:

Tip 20:  Gather the right support for you (then tell them!)

Research coming out of sports psychology suggests that the type and timing of support an athlete gets can have very beneficial effects on their performance, how they manage stress and even how they cope with injury.  Four types of support that seem to make a difference are emotional, esteem, informational and tangible support.  Emotional support refers to others who provide comfort and security, so that the athlete feels loved and cared for.  Esteem support refers to the provision of support which bolsters an athlete’s sense of competence or self-esteem.  Informational support refers to support from others which provides advice and guidance to the athlete and this includes technical advice from a coach, for example. Tangible support refers to support provided by others which is concrete, instrumental assistance, which might include things like provision of equipment or transport to and from events. 

Knowing what type support you need, from whom and when you need it can add extra energy to the pursuit of your goals.  Once you have worked out what you need, tell those around you, so that they can help you in the way that will really work for you.  (It will also avoid those well-intentioned but ultimately unhelpful comments, like 'You should be happy with your shape' or 'You know it's the trying that counts, so don't worry if you don't succeed'.  There's nothing wrong with these in themselves, but if they are not aligned to your own goal or not what you need, then they are only going to get in the way).

Here is an example of how you can seek the right kind of support for you.  Imagine a business man wants to develop his career by taking up opportunities to speak at large conferences.

Emotional support might be seeking the encouragement of others or having others around him who can allay his fears in the early stages.  It might be having a friend around to 'pick him up' if his first attempt doesn't go as well as planned.

Esteem support might be provided by working on his beliefs around his right to work with other experts, or having trusted friends tell him that they believe in him and what he is doing.  It could be that he needs to have affirmation from others that what he is doing is worthwhile and relevant.

Information support might be signing up for some courses in speaking and presentation skills where he gets feedback, advice and a development plan from an expert in the field.  It might also include access to experts, researchers etc from whom he can gain up-to-date knowledge about his subject area.  He may decide he needs a mentor who has 'been there, done that'.

Tangible support could mean that he appoints a PA to organise his speaking diary.  It might mean having someone set up the audio/visual equipment he needs or someone to drive him to the venue.  (ie taking all the fuss and stress out of the situation so that he can concentrate on his performance).

You can see from the above example, that the information and tangible support are more 'concrete' and contain specific information.  Esteem and emotional support are more abstract and could be either general or specific in their nature.  You might find that you only need certain types of support - if you are extremely confident in your ability, you might only need technical advice to 'tweak' your performance.  You might also find that you need different support at different times.  In his biography, the cyclist Mark Cavendish said that all he needed before a race was 'someone to blow sunshine up my ass' - I took that to mean that too much information prior to a race was not helpful!

Social support is a really interesting topic and if you want to find out more a good starting point is:

Rees, T. (2007)  Influence of social support on athletes. In S. Jowett & D. Lavallee (Eds.) (p223-231) Social Psychology in Sport. Champaign:  Human Kinetics.