Business Bites: Recognise your abilities

Imposter syndrome is an irrational insecurity caused by a lack of internal recognition of your achievements

Successful people can sometimes find themselves in situations of self-doubt, feeling inadequate, insecure or even feeling like a fraud.

They may feel that they have not earned the praise or promotion that they have been given, or they may feel like they have just been lucky thus far. There may be self-criticism, a fear of failing, a sense of inferiority.

Quite often, these people will downplay their successes as they may struggle to take a compliment. Believe it or not, this happens to many more people than you might imagine. In fact it even has a name – imposter syndrome.

Overcoming imposter syndrome

Imposter syndrome (IS) is an irrational insecurity caused by a lack of internal recognition of your achievements. It can happen at times of transition and change, for example, a new job or a promotion. Basically, anything that puts you outside your pre-existing comfort zone.

The first thing to help overcome IS is to recognise it, accept that it is quite normal and affects many people. You can also utilise the positive effect that IS has on you: it allows quite deep introspection. This introspection, if channelled well, will help you to grow and to change.

So, what signs may there be that you are suffering from IS? They could include overworking, obsessing over details, perfectionist tendencies – all driven by the fear of being inadequate.

To help with your introspection, you may wish to reach out to others for feedback on your performance or your role. Choose someone who you can trust and who will help you to recognise your performance traits. During the feedback process, you will have opportunity to elaborate on the points being discussed and spotlight your real strengths. Don’t be afraid to ask for help or to collaborate.

Metacognitive awareness

Metacognition may also help in this process. According to Psychology Today, ‘Metacognition is the act of thinking about one’s own mental processes. Metacognitive awareness allows people to identify, monitor, and uproot negative self-talk and self-limiting beliefs, and to be efficient in goal setting and task execution. Thinking about and challenging one’s own thinking is at the heart of many types of therapy.’

Own your achievements. Some may struggle with the concept of self-promotion. It may be something that makes you feel uncomfortable, but to be on a level playing field with those who regularly self-promote, you need to highlight your great work every now and then and not just trust to chance that your peers and superiors will notice that you have done a fine job.

Maybe think about an area, or areas, that you are more comfortable talking about. Is there a particular achievement that you love and are proud of? You can utilise this to show how you wish to be seen in your workplace.

Do not forget to help promote others that you have worked with and recognised their abilities. This reflects well on you too, as it will be clear that you recognise value in others skills, experience and knowledge.

Become a career mentor

So, what else may help you to overcome IS? Mentoring is a great route. Do you ever look at successful people within your profession and wonder how they got there? Everyone has that one person who they look up to, and wish that they could emulate their success. That is where career mentoring comes in.

A career mentor is a person who is able and willing to listen to and help you with your career goals, challenges and fears. Your mentor should be someone who has gone through the same type of challenges you are going through today.

The role of mentor isn’t to have all of the answers; it is to be able to share your knowledge, perspective and experience and to work with the mentee and act as a sounding-board to their ideas and proposed solutions. Your role will be to ensure that they look at as many different options and scenarios as possible. Even if you don’t have the answers, you are likely to have a very good idea of how they can go about finding the answer.

Advantages of mentoring may include:

Widening your perspective: By working with a mentee, you will provide your own perspective and gain insight into how others approach challenges. In turn, you may learn new things in the process.

Improving your self-belief and confidence: Once you start working with a mentee, you will soon realise just how much valuable knowledge and experience you have and how even things that you think are obvious may be very valuable to a mentee.

Gaining the feel-good factor: Being a mentor feels rewarding. Knowing that your skills and experience has helped someone else to succeed is a great feeling. Mentors report experiencing lower levels of anxiety, and describe their jobs as more meaningful, than those who do not mentor.

Dunning-Kruger effect

So, is there an opposite of IS? If people with IS suffer from fears of being a fraud and lack self-confidence, those illustrating the Dunning-Kruger effect are over-confident in their own abilities, skills and knowledge.

As we read in the article from Psychology Today, the concept of the Dunning-Kruger effect is based on a 1999 paper by Cornell University psychologists, David Dunning and Justin Kruger. The Dunning-Kruger effect results in what’s known as a ‘double curse’ – because not only do people perform poorly, but they are not self-aware enough to judge themselves accurately—and are thus unlikely to learn and grow.

Interestingly, some of the methods used to overcome IS can also be utilised by people with Dunning-Kruger, namely utilising feedback and views from others. This could be trusted colleagues, family, friends or again a mentor.

Watch ‘Why ignorance fails to recognise itself’ featuring David Dunning here.