Does Overconfidence Really Improve Performance?

In a new article in the California Management Review titled “Perfectly Confident Leadership,” Berkeley Haas Prof. Don Moore questions whether overconfidence really does improve performance.

Confidence does not help measure skill and Moore, who has studied confidence and overconfidence for 20 years, discusses how to become a balanced leader – one who is confident as well as honest. His studies have revealed that people with different levels of confidence performed at the same level and yet, those with higher confidence were expected to perform better than those with lower confidence levels. Confidence has an effect on other perceptions of that person and their work, but not on the work itself.