Stats: Up to 70% of all people experience impostor feelings in their lifetime, according to the International Journal of Behavioral Science.
“I feel compelled to think of myself as an involuntary swindler”
– Albert Einstein
Do you ever feel like a fraud in the workplace, waiting to be “found out” by your boss, or your employees? Do you ever attribute your success to luck rather than to your abilities? If you do, you are most likely dealing with impostor feelings. And you’re not alone.
According to the literature on the subject, impostor syndrome is the tendency to doubt the obvious evidence of our own abilities and the difficulty with internalizing our accomplishments.
The phenomenon can happen at any point in someone’s career. It can impact women and men from all walks of life, yet high achievers who work in fast-paced work environments are more susceptible to experience it. Michelle Obama, Jennifer Lopez, Tom Hanks, or Albert Einstein all shared their struggle to feel deserving of their own success.
Not only can impostor syndrome have detrimental consequences for a person’s well-being or career advancement, but there are also measurable consequences for a company when its employees, managers, or executives are experiencing impostor syndrome.
For many of us, impostor syndrome is a real but invisible barrier with detrimental outcomes. Impostor feelings make us play small, self-sabotage, be afraid to speak up or be seen, and downplay our abilities.
What have your impostor feelings cost you? Your career, your mental health, or your relationship? Before it costs you everything, it’s time to reclaim your power.
The key to address impostor syndrome is not what you can do about it, but what an individual or an organization can do to benefit from it.
Four strategies to address impostor syndrome at the workplace:
- Create a work environment where individuals are treated by others as a person of value and worth.
- Discuss the topic openly across the organization, from entry level to senior level. This will help employees and leaders understand that feelings of being a fraud are normal.
- Address the syndrome early on by providing confidence training as part of the orientation training for new employees.
- Hire a business coach to teach essential skills to address imposter syndrome, for example, how to reframe impostor thoughts in ways that help to combat the feeling of being a fraud.
