The Confidence Myth: Women don’t lack confidence, men just have too much

9 Feb

Women lack confidence.

We hear it all the time.

We hesitate to speak up. We don’t take enough risks. We need to “believe in ourselves more.”

But what if that’s not the real issue?

What if women’s confidence isn’t low - but actually accurate? And what if the real outlier is men’s overconfidence, not women’s self-doubt?

Let’s break this down.

Women’s confidence is more accurately calibrated

Psychological research consistently shows that:

Women assess their abilities more realistically than men.
Men tend to overestimate their abilities, even when they lack the skills.
Women listen to both positive and negative feedback, whereas men selectively absorb only the praise (because it validates their inflated self-image).

And why is it that men overestimate their abilities? Here, narcissism plays a role. A quick reminder on what narcissism is: A personality trait (or disorder) characterised by grandiosity, need for admiration, and lack of empathy.

A study by Grijalva et al (2015) found that men tend to be more naturally narcissistic than women. Additionally, Macenczak et al. (2016) found that narcissism is significantly correlated with overconfidence. Narcissists consistently overestimated their abilities and showed increased risk-taking in knowledge-based tasks. Macenczak and colleagues also found that when narcissistic individuals gain power (such as through leadership), their overconfidence increases even more.

So instead of assuming women lack confidence, we should recognise that men’s confidence is often an illusion, driven by narcissism rather than actual ability.

The workplace rewards overconfidence, even when it leads to bad decisions

We’ve all seen it:

The guy who speaks up in every meeting, sounding sure of himself - despite being objectively wrong.
The manager who confidently makes risky decisions without considering the consequences.
The male colleague who applies for a job he’s barely qualified for - and gets it.

Men’s overconfidence isn’t just tolerated in the workplace - it’s rewarded. We mistake their confidence for competence, while women’s accurate self-assessment is seen as hesitation or lack of ambition - particularly when it comes to leadership.

And what happens when overconfident men move into leadership?

They often make reckless decisions
They make riskier, poorer investments
They surround themselves with "yes men" and ignore dissenting voices.

Overconfident leaders tend to dismiss criticism and alternative perspectives because they believe they’re always right. Narcissistic CEOs and managers reward loyalty over competence, leading to groupthink, bad decision-making, and lack of accountability. This creates a toxic leadership culture where feedback is ignored, and risky, uninformed decisions go unchallenged.

Challenging this, organisations with more female board members perform better because women temper male overconfidence and promote more rational decision-making (Chen, Leung, Song, and Goergen, 2019).

The problem isn’t that women are too cautious. The problem is that we reward overconfidence - even when it leads to bad outcomes.

Stop telling women to "be more confident" - fix the system instead

Women don’t need to ‘lean in’ harder or fake confidence to get ahead. We need to stop mistaking arrogance for ability.

Here’s what needs to change:
✔ Redefine confidence as accuracy, not bravado.

✔ Stop mistaking loudness for leadership.

✔ Value evidence-based decision-making over gut-driven risk-taking.

✔ Encourage hiring and promotions based on actual skills, not self-promotion.

That last one is particularly provocative - because how many of us now believe we have to ‘build a personal brand’ if we want to get ahead? And how many of us are truly comfortable shouting about our abilities and achievements in the way we think we need to in order to get noticed? (Certainly not me). I’ve written about building your personal brand before, but that’s not to say that I agree this is the ‘right’ thing to do - just what we need to do in order to survive in this system.