Imposter syndrome can strike just about anyone, it’s the feeling that if people really knew who you were then you’d be busted, and held up us some kind of fraud. It’s the felling like we don’ really deserve to be ‘there’ or aren’t ‘qualified’. At the core of this is a sense of insufficiency.
Depending on who you ask, you might get different responses on how to cope with it. I was recently asked by a young student who was working her first few days on an internship how to deal with her sense of imposter syndrome. She’s smart and is midway through her masters, and in many ways represents a typical student. She has a small amount of work experience, but none that is directly relevant to the internship – hence why she is in the role to build experience.
In discussing her approach so far, she mentioned she had simply been trying to ‘fake it, until you make it’. Meaning she had been pretending to be confident, and that she knew what she was doing and that she had it all under control. She confessed though that this had been causing her a lot of stress, as anytime she didn’t know what to do or made a mistake it was causing a crack in the thin veneer of her act.
Other than the stress involved in this moment, I think there is a secondary danger involved in this approach. Which is that you can come across as aloof or even arrogant. Two traits I would argue are unhelpful when trying to build new relationships in a work environment, and when you are there to learn and grow as a human being.
The alternative
I suggested an alternative path based on some general guiding principles I think tend to be relevant most of the time. The first idea is simply being present and acknowledging the feelings you’re having. You don’t have to make these public and go around the office saying how nervous you are, but I think being aware of those feelings you’re having and letting them be present is crucial. The alternative of suppressing you’re feelings and acting like they are not there is a unhealthy response in the long run. Ed Batista has an article I really enjoy about how to have your feelings without them taking over.
The second step is then a reality check – do people expect you to know everything and be an expert? In her case the answer is a clear ‘no’ – as an intern you’re expected to be new to the role and to learn on the job. The entire position is built up around the idea that you don’t yet have the experience you need – so any expectations of expertise or competency is unrealistic. I recommended that she re-frame her perspective around what others expectations of her were likely to be, that is it was unlikely her new colleagues were expecting her to be an expert, and her acting like one would likely have been counterproductive. This might not be true to for you reading this article, you might be experienced and expected to be competent – regardless these next paragraphs are still relevant for you.
I suggested that she adopt two key traits I the coming weeks to the best of her abilities. One was a sense of workplace appropriate vulnerability and the second was a sense of energy and enthusiasm. Staring with the vulnerability part, I suggested to her that anytime she was given a task she could try to ask a few follow up questions, such as how has this been carried out before? Who has previously done the task that I might be able to ask for specific tips or advice from? Do you have any pointers about how I should solve this. There is a balance to strike here, where you are not wanting to perceived as showing a lack of initiative, or an inability to think for yourself. It is equally important to then discuss how you think you would solve it, or what you plan to do.
Workplace vulnerability is also equally not about sharing every single detail about who you are. Colleagues probably don’t need to or want to know every detail about your personal life. Instead it is about letting your colleagues know how it is going with discussions around things like ‘I’m finding this task a struggle, am I approaching it correctly in your view?’ or ‘Could you give me a quick piece of feedback about this solution, I am feeling a little uncertain about my work’. Workplace vulnerability is different from workplace incompetence, as Partick Lecioni points out in an example where he says if you come into the workplace everyday saying ‘whoops I made a mess of that’ or ‘I did that wrong – again’ then it’s not vulnerability but incompetence.
The positive upside of vulnerability is that it allows others to connect with you. It makes you approachable and human. In opening up for others it becomes an invitation for them to build a bridge of connection. In this students case I think she has a much greater chance of making friends if she follows this approach, instead of being aloof. Especially paired with the next traits around energy and enthusiasm.
It's difficult to get mad at someone with energy and enthusiasm for a task, who is engaged in trying to learn as much as possible, and who is open and honest about the limits of their knowledge and capacity. This goes for the intern, but also for the experienced expert. My colleague is a worldwide leader in his field, and yet everytime I have seen him enter a factory he is like a little kid. His eyes light up with excitement and he starts asking questions and trying to learn as much as possible. In theory there should be a power distance between him as the expert and the people working on the shop floor. Yet he is a master at flipping this and making the workers the experts at their own factory (which they are) and using the opportunity to learn as much from them as possible. He is humble in that he doesn’t pretend to know everything, and yet his enthusiasm for listening and soaking it all up is palatable. Eventually his questions become more directed and the workers begin to answer with things like ‘interesting, hadn’t thought of that before’, and when he does eventually come with ideas they tend to be well received.
Again, energy and enthusiasm goes a long way towards building connections. People like being around those who are engaged and enthusiastic, and they ted to be more forgiving of mistakes that are made under these conditions. The other upside with enthusiasm is that it tends to be contagious, your energy will bubble over to others. I still remember my undergrad statistics teacher – he was full of enthusiasm, I loved the class and got an A- despite the fact that I actually don’t find statistics as a subject very engaging. But such is the power of enthusiasm that it makes to permeate into groups when one person turns up truly engaged. I also would be willing to suggest you have a better time too when you allow yourself to be enthused. I think we are often great at hiding enthusiasm because we are worried it might seem silly or childish. Yet when we are vulnerable enough to show these qualities they ten to light up the room.
So the next time you’re feeling like the imposter, instead of pretending and faking it, I would invite you to try a little vulnerability paired with a dollop of energy and enthusiasm. Good luck.
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