When You Oversell Your Abilities and It Backfires

by Ron Carucci and Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic

March 24, 2025

Peter Cade/Getty Images

Summary.

Ben, an executive coaching client of Ron’s who was one of three candidates being considered as the next CEO of his company, said to him, “I have to convince them that I’m better than I am!”

Ron Carucci is cofounder and managing partner at Navalent, working with CEOs and executives pursuing transformational change. He is the best-selling author of 10 books, including To Be Honest: Lead with the Power of Trust, Justice and Purpose (Kogan Page, 2021).

Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic is the chief innovation officer at ManpowerGroup, a professor of business psychology at University College London and at Columbia University, a cofounder of deepersignals.com, and an associate at Harvard’s Entrepreneurial Finance Lab. He is the author of Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders? (and How to Fix It) (Harvard Business Review Press, 2019), upon which his TEDx talk was based. His latest book is I, Human: AI, Automation, and the Quest to Reclaim What Makes Us Unique, (Harvard Business Review Press, 2023).

@drtcp

Read more on Managing yourself or related topics Authenticity and Trustworthiness

When You Oversell Your Abilities and It Backfires

Summary.

Partner Center