Imposters hiding in the shadows

For today’s story let’s meet Jason.   Jason is VP of Operations at a reasonable sized firm in the US mid-west.   He joined his firm fresh from college.  Spent his first few years in roles supporting different VPs in the company and learned a great deal – the best and the worst from each of them.

In a way, though not being vice-president, Jason was half-living that life.  He prepared all the papers for board meetings, analysed the performance, prepared what his boss was going in to say, did all the background calling round people before important decisions to get insight and things done.  The only thing he didn’t do was go into the board room and be that boss.

Until one day he was invited to step up into a vice-president position when an opening came up and he jumped at the chance, it was a dream come true.   Except that living the dream was a very different undertaking to orchestrating things from behind the scenes.

This was the moment Jason had been waiting for.  He’s joined the company’s graduate programme to be part of this world.  He’d done the mentoring, the modelling, tried out the role for size as an executive assistant and now that the big chair was his, he was feeling imposter syndrome for the first time.   What gives?

In his first few months Jason’s intellect and experience allowed him to settle in to the role, but something didn’t sit quite right.   Needing the defend his department from a round of budget cuts, he did all the analysis, looked at all the different options.  He spent every evening for two weeks tracking down other VPs and senior folk to run through his plans, gain perspective, garner support. 

The eventual budget meeting for the committee was a bruising experience.   Agreements he thought he’d made with other VPs were reneged upon and Jason lacked the confidence to truly stand behind his plan.

Even though he felt he had agreements in place from just a few hours ago, he felt challenging more experienced committee members to be beyond his place as a recently promoted member.  His inexperience showed and in debate after debate he found himself ceding ground and losing the majority of arguments, he’d been able to win comfortably behind the scenes.

“Maybe I really wasn’t ready for this”, he questioned himself.  “But now there’s no way back down, just head for the exit”.

Jason sensibly went to talk with Marta, his mentor.

“I’m so stupid, I can’t believe I fell for this, they must all think I’m really stupid”

“I’ve shown myself to be naïve and incompetent, how can anyone now take me seriously in that room”

We call this catastrophising and Jason was full speed ahead ready to convince himself the promotion had all been a big mistake and to save face he should start to look for a job elsewhere.   Fortunately, he had Marta to help.

“What evidence do you really have for these thoughts Jason, has anyone said them to you”, she asked?

“Not exactly but I imagine they would because that’s what I’d be thinking”

Marta recalled a story of her first fumble at a board meeting and without naming names, went on to describe another fumble someone had made, and another fumble and Jason started to get the sense of not being entirely alone.

“The thing is Jason, you’re observing the game not really playing it fully”.

This one struck hard.  Marta’s observation that Jason had spent a long time as an assistant, setting up the show, pulling strings, observing the performance but never having to actually be part of it.  

Questioning him gently about how much time he’d spent with board members after the meeting he replied meekly that he’d actively avoided meeting some of the members for fear of deepening his embarrassment.  And yet as an assistant he would have happily gone round the board canvassing for opinions and support to make sure a proposal truly got through.

Marta’s sage guidance to Jason consisted of three steps.

1.       Recognise your tendency to catastrophise and develop perspective

When we use absolute words such as always and never or we describe ourselves in uncompromisingly bleak terms such as idiot or stupid, often we know this not to be true.  

If you follow the work of Eric Berne, he’d be saying we do this secretly waiting for someone to come to rescue us.  It's a risky game where we increase the pressure on ourselves but if someone doesn’t step in, within time, if you don’t have a Marta, you risk believing the lies you are telling yourself.

Marta encouraged Jason to go speak with Don, one of the older members of the committee, who in his time had seen a few Jasons promoted to the committee and ask him for an opinion.   Don helped Jason to get some perspective.  Sure, the meeting hadn’t gone brilliantly but “the thing is Jason, you have to fully present – you can try being the back-stage leader but at some point those playing the game on the stage are going to do something different.  And you’re either there or not and everyone knows if you’re not present”.

Don and Marta encouraged Jason to go off and talk to the other committee members which helped him gain perspective about the meeting and their regard for him as a leader.  Overwhelmingly his fellow committee members encouraged the same thing – be present and be with us, it’s time to stop trying to manage everything from back-stage as a leader.

2.      Recognise the narrative behind your imposter

This was a bit tougher but with Marta and Don’s help they encouraged Jason to find the triggers that set off his Imposter Syndrome. 

First in his family to go to a prestigious college on a scholarship he did his parents proud but his relationship with authority was tricky for his to master.   Having been dependent on authority and patronage to support his education, his big break into this company and then his progression within the company, Jason had set up in his mind a construct where he could only perform and succeed through serving people.

And now he was in his VP role it wasn’t possible to succeed by being subservient to others.   For the challenge in front of him Jason had an unhelpful relationship with positions of authority.   Marta and Don worked with Jason to help him see this as his trigger and work to overcome it.

The two techniques they used are helpful to others. 

Firstly, encouraging Jason to be better tuned to his strengths and qualities and recall his considerable insight around how these strengths matched up against those of his fellow board members. 

Secondly to remind him that he had earned his place on this board through the recommendation of most of those present.   Therefore, he had both the skill and the right to be there.   Playing in the shadows was his choice to make and unmake.

3.      Owning your truth, and see your true self in others.

Jason was lucky to have Marta and Don on his board of advisors.  With their help he realised the values that had got him this far – of being in the service of other people who got to make the real stuff happen, had to change.

Not only was Jason’s willingness to please others something he needed to modify and mature in but as an unhelpful narrative, it was likely holding back others who were earlier still in their career.

Jason set up a development circle for new joiners to the company’s leadership programme.  Initially helpful new starters to feel welcomed, Jason offered mentoring and guidance to small groups.  Working with these younger versions of himself allowed him to reflect both on his growth and progress but also things within him that really hadn’t advanced as quickly as he’d liked.

A neat trick of giving back to others whilst helping develop himself.   We knew Jason had it in him!

Summing up

Imposter Syndrome comes in many different shapes and sizes but it all comes down to where the expectations of ourselves and reality bite together.

When we’ve grown up in the service of others, we become used to seeing achievements through the work of other people.  When we step up into leadership, because there is always another boss, we can sometimes be tempted to see our role as creating achievements through this new person instead of for ourselves.

If you’ve grown up with service as a value, there’s no need to lose it all.  But you can redefine it.  Service to your peers means playing your full contribution not playing in the shadows.  Service to your team means setting the example you wish they would follow.   Service to yourself means honouring the gifts you have and making them count, for our time is finite.

Liked this article – check out more resources at www.ianbrowne.com

If this strikes a chord, let’s chat about your imposter and how I can help you put it back in its box.   https://oncehub.com/careersredesigned

Out there are many people suffering from imposter syndrome – I’m grateful for you sharing Thriving Leader with others.