How to deal with ‘Impostor Syndrome’
Are you secretly petrified of being ‘found out’? Do you think that others at your level must know more than you? Do you feel like you don’t belong, so you overprepare, just in case you don’t sound good enough? On a leadership development programme I was running this year, every individual got executive coaching. These were senior managers and at least half had some level of impostor syndrome and it was holding them back! In this blog I want to offer some ways of working with Impostor Syndrome and its very close first cousin – the inner critic!
What is Impostor Syndrome?
Psychologists Pauline Clance and Suzanne Imes coined the term ‘impostor phenomenon’ in 1978, which they described as a pattern where high-achieving people can’t internalise their own success – attributing it instead to luck, timing, or other people, while living with a persistent fear of being “found out.” They deliberately called it a ‘phenomenon’ and not a ‘syndrome’, as it is not a clinical diagnosis.
This is a very normal human pattern that can show up when people get promoted, or start a new job, or when they are surrounded by other very capable employees. Furthermore, people can feel confident in one area but have impostor syndrome in another. Effectively we can get stuck in the sense of ‘not being good enough’ and are then left ‘waiting to be found out’, which impacts on how we show up. When we are asked to step-up to something new, it triggers anxiety and we either overprepare or procrastinate. Both come at a cost. Overpreparing costs time and worry, procrastinating brings that horrible feeling in the pit of your stomach as the deadline looms, and the stress of pulling it together at the last minute! And the irony is that when it goes well, we credit the overpreparing or the last-minute scramble rather than our ability, so the impostor feelings persist. Clance called this the impostor cycle.
A note of caution: it’s worth asking whether this is coming from you or from the workplace conditions you’re in. If it is the workplace, that doesn’t make the internal work any less worthwhile. In fact, it is even more important that you focus on it to enable your sense of confidence and agency.
Impostor Syndrome and the Inner Critic: Both Matter!
When we have these feelings of not deserving our place, of not being ‘good enough’ our internal voice matters. If we have a strong inner critic, it will look for the evidence to support our impostor syndrome and will highlight what we are ‘getting wrong’. While impostor syndrome is the underlying pattern (recurring doubts about our competence, and belonging), the inner critic is one of the main processes that keeps that pattern alive.
Particularly as we start to grow into our new role or level, and start to build our confidence, managing the inner critic becomes very important. If we can tame its harsh, undermining narrative, we can start to own our competence and grow our sense of belonging exactly where we are.
How To Deal With Impostor Syndrome (At Work)
1. Check The ‘Story You Are Telling Yourself’
We all have an inner narrative about who we are and how we got ‘here’! Does yours support you? How do you know it is even true? We can get caught in an old version of ourselves – and keep reinforcing that old thinking, even when we have successfully done the thing we think we aren’t good at (presenting to the board, say, or managing at a more senior level than before). We don’t update the script. We don’t internalise what we’ve done well, because we focus only on identifying where we need more work.
You can test the story yourself. A question I often ask is “what lets you know that?” The answer can be illuminating – sometimes there are no real gaps, just nerves. Sometimes there are minor gaps that have been promoted to major ones in the person’s head.
It can also be useful to get third-party feedback – from a boss, a mentor or a trusted colleague. There are 360-degree feedback tools that can give you a holistic view of how others experience you. And a very useful exercise is to mine your experience – accurately reflect (perhaps with the support of an executive coach) on what you have accomplished. What are you already displaying in terms of competence that you aren’t recognising yet? Getting this support and sharing your sense of impostor syndrome with trusted colleagues has a further vital side-effect: it lessens the feelings of shame and the need to hide, which helps weaken its grip.
This isn’t about ignoring your opportunities for growth – but rather understanding them and where you are already competent (your existing strengths). This is what builds accurate self-confidence, and what should inform your development plan: build on the strengths you already have, while you address current opportunities for growth.
2. Jump Right In And Learn
The most debilitating part of impostor syndrome is avoidance. The antidote is the answer nobody wants to hear: jump in anyway! I have worked with people who can list the projects they haven’t taken on, the roles they haven’t gone for, the conferences they have avoided and the times they didn’t do the presentation, all in service of not being found wanting. The good news is that when we do get it wrong – or, more accurately, do it less well than we think we should have – others are usually on our side. There’s research behind this. Psychologists have found that we see our own moments of vulnerability – admitting a mistake, asking for help, saying ‘I don’t know’ – as weakness, while others tend to see them as courage. They call it the ‘beautiful mess effect’. We also overestimate how much others notice our slip-ups in the first place – the ‘spotlight effect’. So, what we need to do is prepare ‘enough’, jump in, and learn from our experience. When we succeed without overpreparing, we get real evidence of our ability – and that starts to break the cycle.
The best way to learn is to ask yourself some good reflective questions (Borton’s reflective model):
- What? What happened, the good and the bad?
- So what? What can you learn from this experience?
- Now what? What will you do differently in the future?
As a second step, you can also ask others – boss/mentor/trusted colleague. If you do, get curious about the differences in their feedback versus your own reflections. If your inner critic is very alive, they might have seen some real strengths in your performance that you are discounting. Again, this helps build accurate self-confidence and starts to dial down the inner critic.
3. Dial Down Your Inner Critic
This voice has been with you for years and may even be the reason you think you have been successful in the past! It’s the voice that ensured you dotted all the ‘i’s’ and crossed and re-crossed the ‘t’s’ (your inner perfectionist)! The first step in modulating it is to start to notice how it actually sounds (whose words are they?) and when it is triggered in you (are there specific situations or types of people that evoke it?).
Some people like to give it a name, and label the thoughts as being from that name: mine is Nelly! This can serve to create distance, and maybe even allow you to inject a bit of humour, when you notice it. The main thing to remember is that while the inner critic is there as a form of protection – it is not up to speed with where you are now in life. As you notice the harshness of the words – you might ask, would I ever say that to anyone else I care about? The answer is typically no. Working on your self-talk in this way allows you to notice it and let it go.
4. Build Your Inner Coach
Just as we often have an active inner critic, we equally have a very wise part. This is the voice we want to build. Often, we will encounter this part of ourselves in how we are with those we care deeply about. We are willing them on to success, able to see their strengths, and when we challenge them, it is with a view to their growth and development. This isn’t about avoiding seeing our development opportunities. Rather when we bring compassion to ourselves, we can see them more fully and work with them more intentionally. Just as impostor syndrome is often the trigger for avoidance, that inner wise voice gives you the grounding to take risks and jump in! You might ask yourself, “what would I say to X in this situation?” Using the reflective practice model above can equally help – particularly if you focus on bringing in that wise part of you.
Breaking Free from Impostor Syndrome
Loosening the grip of impostor syndrome takes time. The goal is not to silence every doubt, but to stop letting doubt dictate your decisions and curb your opportunities. If you are dealing with it, you are not alone – in fact you are in very good company. If you’re struggling with impostor syndrome, get in touch. Contact me online and we can talk it through together and explore what might be useful for you.