Pippa Moyle, CEO and Founder of the City Girl Network suggests applying for awards should improve your confidence, and maybe teach you something about yourself

Putting myself forward for accolades such as Dynamic Awards is one of the most terrifying parts of running a business. Not the sales meetings, or public speaking, or interviewing, or cashflow sorting; it’s the awards applications. The day-to-day ‘scaries’ are all a part of the daily job description of being a company director. Awards are another thing entirely.

When you apply for an award, you are boldly advocating for yourself, and think others should applaud your worth. You can’t protect yourself with waves of apologies or self-deprecation. You have to present a strong evidential case as to why you’re brilliant. And then you need to deal with the self-imposed embarrassment when you don’t make it through.

We’re all familiar with the Confidence Gap; the gendered disparity of a woman underestimating her abilities, whilst a man overestimates his. I’ve sat on numerous panels over the years where the study of women only applying for a job if they’re 100% qualified, in comparison to men who apply at 60%, is brought up. It’s around 75% of female executives who have experienced imposter syndrome (KPMG, 2020), as well as numerous iterations of studies finding that women are less likely to self-promote.

There’s also the Authority Gap, referring to the systemic bias where a woman’s expertise, opinions and leadership is taken less seriously than a man’s – despite them having equal or greater qualifications. It leads to statistics like women being interrupted 33% more than men in meetings and discussions (Harvard Business Review, 2014) and women being cited less than men in professional and academic work (Princeton University, 2017).

It’s far less hassle to over-apologise your way into these gaps – along with the gaps of pay, investment, leadership, pension, funding, media visibility and time – with a cup of tea that you accept you’ll be making for the other men in the boardroom. But the external validation, recognition, visibility and growth opportunities of awards is so much more fun.

Let’s get one thing straight: I’m not an award-winner. I’ve applied for 12 awards and haven’t made the shortlist for any of them. I’ve “wasted time”, “not been ready”, “not been worth it” and all of the other self-limiting beliefs that prevent so many women from entering in the first place.

Except, I haven’t thought any of those things when the shortlist is announced without my name on it – just an exhale of disappointment, an inhale of pride for backing myself, and a sassy deletion of the shortlist announcement from my inbox.

If the fear of failure and rejection is what’s holding you back from applying for an award, I hope that you’ve learnt from my experience that the worst case scenario isn’t actually that monumental at all. In fact, every awards application I’ve written has had an incredibly positive impact on my business, my self esteem and my turnover.

I’ve learned different ways of communicating my revenue streams, values and ethics, which have all been threaded into sales proposals and media packs. It’s also helped me to refine my own personal narratives and goals. Take the Dynamic Awards – this year, I’m going for the Community Hero and Inspirational Award. I often go for the ‘Community Hero’ type category in awards; I run 19 communities across the UK, after all, and lead with social impact over profit. It’s a great opportunity to craft our message.

The Inspirational Award is about setting myself a personal challenge. I’m chronically self-deprecating and uncomfortable around praise. Yet, the only way that I find the confidence to go for the ‘big hitters’ in my sales pipeline is through evidence-led affirmations that I’m the best person to bring them in. I might not win an award, but I’ll definitely win a client.

You and I both know that winning awards opens doors, boosts credibility and is an enormous personal triumph. But there’s an added power when awards are won by women and marginalised genders. Barriers are broken, narratives are rewritten and those gaps start to close. It’s a ripple effect that we have the power to amplify.