Nikita – the trainer who stepped up

    When a popular trainer quit mid-batch and threw a software training center into chaos, one junior trainer named Nikita stood up and said, "I'll handle it." Her self-confidence saved the center's reputation — and taught me what self-belief really looks like at work.

    Nikita – the trainer who stepped up

    Nikita – the trainer who stepped up

    A software training center. A popular trainer who quits on the spot, mid-batch, leaving paying students stranded. And in the middle of the chaos, one junior trainer named Nikita stands up and says four words that change everything: "I can handle it." This is a true story from my book, and it's the clearest example I know of what self-confidence actually looks like when it's tested — not in a seminar room, but on a bad Tuesday morning.

    In short

    Where this sits on your Winning Kite

    Self-confidence is the third trait on the EQ — left — side of your Winning Kite (KITE Leadership Framework). It sits right after emotional awareness and self-regulation, because once you understand your emotions and can manage them, the next question is simple: do you actually trust yourself to act? Nikita's story is what that trust looks like when there's no time to think it over. EQ alone doesn't fly a kite — but without this trait, RQ and PQ don't get the chance to either, because nobody steps forward.

    The trainer who quit mid-sentence

    Picture a busy software training center — the kind you'll find in any IT hub in India, running batch after batch of working professionals through certification courses in the evenings and on weekends. Fees paid upfront. Schedules tight. Reputation everything, because in this business, word of mouth is the only marketing that matters.

    One of the center's most popular trainers was a woman named Shruti — sharp, well-liked by students, but known for a short temper. One day, she got into a heated argument with a member of the management team. It escalated. She created what Avinash, describing it in his book, calls a "tamasha" — a scene — and then quit on the spot. Not two weeks' notice. Not even the rest of the day. She walked out, leaving several ongoing batches of paying students completely unfinished.

    For the center, this was close to a five-alarm fire. Clients had paid for full courses. Students had planned their schedules around Shruti's classes. And now there was no one to teach them.

    The silence that follows a crisis

    Here's the part of the story that matters most, and the part most retellings skip past too quickly. The other trainers at the center did not rush in to help. They hesitated.

    Some were unsure if they could actually fill Shruti's shoes — her batches, her syllabus, her rapport with those specific students. Others were afraid of something less obvious but just as real: that stepping into the chaos might mean stepping into the same pressure that had pushed Shruti to explode and quit in the first place. If it broke her, why would it not break them?

    That hesitation is worth sitting with, because it is not laziness and it is not indifference. It is a lack of self-confidence, dressed up as caution. And it is far more common in Indian workplaces than we like to admit — the quiet calculation of "what if I try and fail publicly" that keeps capable people rooted to their chairs while a crisis grows bigger by the hour.

    Meanwhile, students were growing restless. Some were already asking for refunds. The center's good name — built over years — was hanging by a thread over a single bad morning.

    "I can handle it" — Nikita steps forward

    In the middle of all this, Nikita, one of the trainers, stood up and confidently said she could handle the situation. While everyone else around her was busy calculating the risk to themselves, Nikita's self-belief simply showed up and did the talking. She walked up to management and made a direct offer: she would personally take on Shruti's unfinished courses, and she would also help mentor and guide any new trainer who came on board to share the load.

    It was not a small promise. It meant extra teaching hours on top of her own batches. It meant learning where exactly Shruti had left off in each course, sometimes mid-topic. It meant absorbing whatever frustration the students were carrying after their trainer walked out on them without warning. Nikita took all of it on anyway.

    The effect was almost immediate. The moment Nikita said yes, the tension in the room eased. Management had a plan again. The other trainers, who had been frozen by uncertainty, found their footing because someone had shown them what stepping up actually looked like. Nikita guided the new recruit who joined to help, divided up the pending batches sensibly between them, and made sure every single student finished their course without feeling neglected or shortchanged.

    The center's reputation stayed intact. The students left satisfied. And nobody outside that building ever knew how close the whole thing had come to falling apart — because one trainer decided, in the moment it mattered, that she trusted herself enough to try.

    Then it happened again — Trupti's turn

    If Nikita's story stood alone, you could call it a lucky one-off — the right person, in the right mood, on the right day. But the book records a second crisis at the very same center, not long after.

    This time, two trainers simply didn't show up one morning. No resignation letter, no conversation — just a phone call saying they weren't coming back. Their attitude seemed to carry an unspoken assumption: that without them, the office would fall apart.

    It didn't. Another trainer, Trupti, stepped up exactly the way Nikita had. Confident in her own ability, she juggled the pending student batches, took on administrative tasks that weren't originally hers, and tackled the chaos head-on instead of waiting to see who else might volunteer. She rescheduled classes, reassured nervous students directly, and kept the day-to-day office work moving. Because of her self-confidence and her willingness, in Avinash's words, to "fight fires," the center came out on top again.

    Two different trainers. Two different crises. The same pattern: when the people who were expected to hold things together disappeared without warning, it was self-confidence — not seniority, not job title, not years of experience — that decided who stepped into the gap.

    What self-confidence actually is

    Psychologists have a precise term for what Nikita and Trupti both had: self-efficacy — a positive, realistic judgment of your own ability to handle a specific challenge. It's not blind bravado, and it's not the absence of fear. It's the belief, tested and earned, that you can figure it out even when you haven't done this exact thing before.

    People with strong self-efficacy don't wait for guarantees before they act. They take on challenges regardless of the outcome, because they trust their own capacity to adapt along the way. That belief system is what gives birth to real ambition — not the loud kind, the durable kind. Daniel Goleman, whose work on emotional intelligence shaped so much of how the corporate world talks about EQ today, makes a similar point: self-confidence is what lets people take initiative and pursue goals despite uncertainty. I'd only add, from years of watching this play out on Indian shop floors and training centers, that self-confidence rarely announces itself in advance. It shows up exactly once — in the five seconds after everyone else has gone quiet.

    The other side of the coin — when confidence tips over

    I want to be honest here, because self-confidence is a double-edged sword, and I've seen the other edge cut deep. In my own company, an operations manager named Shrinath joined as a hardworking, likeable presence with a good rapport with our Business Head. But his self-confidence went unchecked. He began believing his own ideas were always correct. He took on tasks beyond his real ability and rarely listened to his teammates.

    Over time, his team started feeling ignored. Arguments followed. Morale dropped. Because Shrinath was convinced he was always right, he genuinely could not see his own mistakes — and when promotions came up, he was passed over. Colleagues and managers felt his overconfidence, not his competence, was the real problem. He left the company, and carried the same pattern into his next workplace, and the one after that, struggling every time to climb the ladder.

    Set Shrinath's story next to Nikita's and the difference is stark. Nikita's confidence was anchored to the situation in front of her and stayed open — she coordinated with management, mentored a new recruit, shared the load. Shrinath's confidence had detached from reality and closed itself off from feedback. Real self-confidence, the kind that makes you a star performer instead of a liability, believes in itself while staying accountable to everyone around it.

    Why this matters beyond one training center

    Every organisation, at some point, has its own version of Shruti walking out mid-batch. A key person resigns without notice. A client escalation lands with nobody obviously equipped to handle it. A project lead goes on sudden leave the week before a deadline. In that moment, what decides whether your team survives it gracefully or scrambles visibly is rarely process or paperwork. It's whether someone in the room has enough self-belief to say, out loud, "I'll handle it" — and then actually do the unglamorous work of handling it.

    Nikita and Trupti weren't the most senior people at that training center. They were the ones whose self-confidence was ready when the moment demanded it. That's the trait I train leaders and teams to build deliberately, rather than hope for accidentally, in my Signature Programs and workshops across the EQ side of the Winning Kite.

    How to build this in your own team

    You cannot manufacture self-confidence with a pep talk. But you can build the conditions that let it grow, the same way Nikita's environment — imperfect as it was in that crisis — eventually let her belief translate into action.

    Give people real ownership before a crisis forces it on them, so the first time they carry responsibility isn't also the scariest time. Back a decision publicly once someone has made it in good faith, the way management backed Nikita the moment she volunteered — hesitation from leadership at that point would have undone her courage instantly. And treat every small win as usable evidence, not a one-off — self-efficacy compounds; each time someone proves to themselves they can handle something, the next challenge gets a little less frightening. This is exactly the muscle we build in corporate training programs on emotional intelligence and leadership readiness.

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    Avinash Chate

    TEDx Speaker · Founder, The Future Corporate · Author of Stars at India Inc.

    Avinash has trained the Indian Army, BRO, RBI, BARC, JSW Steel and 1000+ corporate leaders across India. His work focuses on leadership, emotional intelligence and behavioural training rooted in Indian values and modern business needs.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What is the Nikita story from Stars at India Inc about?

    It's a real workplace example from Avinash Chate's book about a software training center thrown into chaos when a senior trainer quit on the spot mid-batch. A junior trainer named Nikita stepped up, took over the unfinished courses, guided a new recruit, and saved the center's reputation — purely on the strength of her self-confidence.

    What is self-confidence in emotional intelligence terms?

    Psychologists call it self-efficacy — a realistic, positive judgment of your own ability to handle a situation. It is the third trait on the EQ side of the Winning Kite framework, and it is the difference between hesitating in a crisis and saying, "I've got this."

    Can self-confidence be a weakness too?

    Yes. Unchecked, self-confidence tips into overconfidence — refusing feedback, ignoring the team, assuming you're always right. Real self-confidence stays anchored to reality and stays open to correction, which is what separates a Nikita from someone who talks big but can't be told anything.

    How can managers build self-confidence in their teams?

    Give people real ownership before a crisis forces it on them, publicly back their decisions once made, and treat small wins as evidence they can build on. Avinash Chate's leadership and EQ workshops use exercises like this to help teams build genuine, tested self-belief rather than borrowed confidence.

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