On Saturday morning, I was mindlessly doomscrolling on social media.
My algorithm is a pretty healthy mix of leadership content, organizational psychology, policy and political analysis… and then, of course, Star Wars memes, Gen X references, and guys building bushcraft shelters in the wilderness. You know… standard middle-aged male stuff.
Anyway, as I was scrolling, I came across some folks talking about something called the Dunning-Kruger Effect. I had never heard of it before.
Now, typically, happening upon an academic discussion is where an alarm goes off in most people’s brains, and they quickly scroll past it on their way to the next cat video.
Not me. Nope, I leaned in because what they were saying hit close to home.
Here’s the idea behind the Dunning-Kruger Effect:
People with limited knowledge in a given area tend to overestimate how much they know — while people who actually know what they’re doing tend to be far more measured.
And there it is. We’ve all seen it, at work, in our families, and more.
It’s certainly a clear explanation for a lot of what we see when we’re leading people.
Also, a pretty accurate description of me earlier in my career.
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By the time I was in my early 20s, I had overcome a lot — more than most people would ever assume from outward appearances.
I seemed to be naturally capable across a number of areas. When I even lightly applied myself, I could step into new situations, figure things out quickly, and get early wins. While this is certainly better than the alternative of trying things and failing at them repeatedly, that combination — some innate ability without much effort plus early success — can be a dangerous cocktail.
Because of these successes, my confidence — actually, let’s call it what it was, my arrogance — started to climb.
In my early Emergency Medical Services career, I was always arguing with people: nurses, doctors, nurses, other EMS professionals — did I mention nurses? — and communications (comm) center folks. While, technically speaking, I would frequently “win” the overwhelming majority of those arguments through a mix of protocol memory and common sense, I would actually lose in the broader scheme of things because of the way in which I won. I may have been correct most of the time, standing on solid logical ground, but I didn’t have the experience to back it up. It all came from my natural (and nurtured) ability to recognize disconnections in the logic and rationale of other people’s decisions. That’s good for building your own confidence, but bad for human relationships. Nobody likes a smart ass, especially one who, when assessed from experience and education alone, had no business being right about a topic.
As a result, I was a thorn in the side of my supervisors. I once had a supervisor counsel me about it. After successfully arguing my point on yet another issue, while completely alienating the person I was arguing with, my supervisor said, “Do you know that the people in the Comm Center call you ‘Arrogant Byzak’?”
I actually chuckled and replied, “Do you know the difference between confident people and arrogant people? Confident people think they’re right… arrogant people just know it.”
He just sighed… clearly the lesson was lost on me in that moment.
I’ll admit, even today, as I’m writing this article to convince you not to be like that, that was a pretty clever response… but it was arrogant and unhelpful in the moment. And the whole interaction said something about who I was and how others saw me. (Thankfully, my keen memory allows me to re-experience that moment and recognize the lesson in it now)
Despite that arrogance, my capabilities carried me a long way, and I soon found myself operating in spaces I had no formal training in, no real depth in, but just enough success to keep moving up… which helped me convince myself I had it all figured out.
And for some time, when people around me tried to give feedback, I didn’t take it well. Not even a little.
I’d hear it and think, Who the hell are you to tell me how to do this? I just did it — successfully — on the first try. “Check the scoreboard,” I used to say, implying that my most recent win was evidence of my understanding and capability.
And in a very narrow sense, maybe that was true.
But my reaction alone was proof that I wasn’t as dialed in as I thought I was. It was the Dunning-Kruger Effect in full effect.
Thinking back on it now, and having many more years of experience under my belt, I recognize that what I was really doing was actually more complicated. It wasn’t just youthfull and inexperienced arrogance.
The truth was I felt like I was fiercely protecting the ground I had just gained. So I treated feedback — especially poorly delivered feedback — as an attack. I felt that I had so much to prove — to others, myself, and the world — and had worked too hard to get there to let anyone poke holes in it. That was a mistake.
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Here’s another the thing I had to learn the hard way:
Most people actually want to help you avoid mistakes and help you improve your performance. It’s just that most people are actually terrible at delivering feedback, and we are equally terrible, if not more so, at receiving it.
Those providjng the feedback often mean well, but the criticism, while intended to be constructive, comes out sideways. It sounds bossy or belittling. It can sound dismissive. Sometimes it sounds like they’re talking down to you or harshly judging your ability.
And sure — there are some people out there who are just jerks and aren’t trying to help you. Some people want to take you down a peg or two, and some others even want to completely derail your progress. That exists. There are plenty of broken folks who act like that.
But, regardless of their actual intentions, most of the time, there’s something useful buried in what they’re saying.
The shift for me was learning to stop reacting to how it was said, or assuming their intentions, and start asking myself:
If this person is even partially right… What’s the truth in it?
That question changed everything.
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As time went on, the more reps (experience) I got, the more I realized something pretty simple: Natural ability and an inclination towards being correct isn’t enough.
In football terms, you can have the arm strength, the instincts, the raw tools — but that doesn’t make you a great quarterback. And some quarterbacks have only flashes of brilliance. Becoming an all-time, seasoned quarterback requires you to be self-reflective and to be coachable.
Seasoned comes from experience. From being in enough situations to recognize patterns, anticipate outcomes, and adjust in real time.
That’s how you start to climb out of the Dunning-Kruger Effect trap.
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That’s also when something else started to change for me.
The more I learned, the less definitive my answers became.
I found myself saying things like, “Well… it depends.”
Not because I didn’t have an opinion, or because I couldn’t make a decision, but because I finally understood what I was actually looking at.
Most real decisions aren’t simple. They’re shaped by context, competing priorities, and complex variables you don’t control — especially the decisions other people are going to make next.
Experience doesn’t eliminate uncertainty. It just sharpens your ability to anticipate it.
You can still make decisions — and sometimes you have to make them quickly — but you do it with a recognition that outcomes are influenced by far more than just your initial call or interpretation of the limited information available to you at the time the decision was made.
For someone stuck in the Dunning-Kruger Effect, that kind of answer sounds like weakness.
But it’s not.
It’s awareness. Here’s another wrinkle to consider, especially as it relates to maintaining the facade of perfection or universal capability, and it’s an important one: Publicly stating your weaknesses or admitting your lack of knowledge or ability is important. You may think that admitting that you aren’t good at something, or don’t know the answer will be perceived as weakness, but the exact opposite is true. Acknowledging your own limitations will actually generally be perceived by most people as a sign of strength, of a willingness to be vulnerable, and an open invitation for others to step in an help provide insight in that area. It also opens the door for others to be vulnerable and admit that they might not have all the answers and tends to bring the group closer together.
As a leader, I’d much rather have my team admit that they don’t know than pretend they do and give bad advice.
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There’s another layer to this — and I still see it all the time.
Especially in people who’ve had to fight their way back from something.
When you’ve been knocked down, overlooked, or written off, or feel that you’ve been held down by the decisions of the people around you or by your early decisions, and then you finally start gaining traction, you develop what I think of as a prism of protection. See my experience above.
You need to protect what you’ve built. It goes like this:
I was a pauper, and now I have a kingdom, small as it may be, but it makes me the master of all I survey. Who is this rogue knight trying to take my land and crown? Don’t they know where I come from and what I’m capable of?
But they aren’t a rogue knight. They’re just a colleague recognizing something and attempting to give feedback. But when feedback comes in — even constructive feedback — it gets filtered as a threat, a challenge, or an attack.
And instead of adjusting, you double down.
Trust me, I’ve been there.
The problem is that mindset pushes away the very people who are trying to help you get better. What feels like self-protection starts to look like arrogance — or worse, an inflated sense of ability that isn’t grounded in reality.
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Real ability — and real confidence — doesn’t show up as defensiveness or arrogance.
It looks like a quiet reflection on the feedback you’ve been given.
A focused assessment of whether it’s actually warranted.
And then a deliberate decision to do something about it.
It’s the willingness to seek out the education, the reps, and the experiences that allow your natural abilities to show up — not once, but consistently over time.
It’s failing… and not letting that failure sideline you.
It’s breaking that failure down, figuring out what actually happened, and using it to reduce the odds you end up in the same spot again.
Importantly, it is also getting comfortable not knowing and admitting as much.
Recognizing capability in other people — and learning from it and emulating it. Taking their strengths, adapting them, and making them your own.
It’s also knowing when something isn’t in your wheelhouse, and having the maturity to either build that skill intentionally… or surround yourself with people who already have it.
Whether you’re leading an organization, contributing as part of a team, or as an individual contributor, the principle is the same:
Know where you’re strong. Be honest about where you’re not. And don’t be afraid to lean on people who are better than you in specific areas.
That’s not weakness. That’s how you actually get better. And it is rewarded by the relationships you build with those around you and the skills you develop through those partnerships.
Aaron J. Byzak, MBA, is a writer, speaker, and lifelong observer and developer of people and systems. He is the Chief Strategist and Lead Consultant for Galvanized Strategies, a strategic public affairs and leadership consulting firm that specializes in healthcare and non-profit clients, but excels across industries. His work draws on more than 30 years of experience in healthcare, leadership, public affairs, mentoring, and coaching — shaped by personal resilience, a deep sense of purpose, and a passion for driving meaningful change.
Read more insight from Aaron by following him on LinkedIn. He can be reached at aaron@galvanizedstrategies.com or at 760.889.3609.
