Have you noticed how the business world has taken note of impostor syndrome in a big way?
In the recent past, colleagues and I have spoken at companies like Pfizer, Vanguard, Johnson & Johnson, Molson Coors, T. Rowe Price, PWC, Carrier, Trane, Liberty Mutual, Rakuten, BP, Sun Life, AXA, KFC, Microsoft, IBM, Boston Consulting Group, Coinbase, CIGNA, Hello Fresh, NASA, RaceTrac, and Deloitte— to name a very few.
For companies like Google, JP Morgan, Microsoft, Siemens, Dell, Diageo, and YUM!, the focus has been on educating employees across the globe.
Major management consulting firms are paying attention too.
And this year, Korn Ferry identified rates of impostor syndrome among employees in the US and internationally, with the highest rates among CEOS followed by senior managers.
Clearly, leaders at these and other organizations recognize impostor syndrome isn’t just an “interesting self-help topic” or “a woman’s issue.” It impacts the bottom line.
Then again this is nothing new.
I’ve been beating the drum about both organizational sources and the costs of impostor syndrome for nearly four decades.
In 1986 I wrote a cover article for Executive Female magazine titled, “Are Achievers Draining Their Companies?“
In some ways, it is clearly dated. For one, the article focuses almost exclusively on women. Today we know others are not immune.
Many of the same points I made about systemic challenges faced by women apply to any group on the receiving end of stereotypes about competence or intelligence based on age, race, disability, class, or language.
And, if I were to write that article today, I’d focus as much on those who could go further if not for this unique form of self-doubt as on the high achievers most often associated with impostor syndrome.
In other ways, though, little has changed, starting with the article’s core message:
When qualified workers fear risks, get caught in the ‘expert trap,’ and are prone to perfectionism and procrastination, there’s a leak in the corporation’s human resources pool.
In fact, the 16-point action plan I laid out then is remarkably relevant today.
Most of my recommendations focused on encouraging leaders to examine the organization’s achievement culture for ways it might fuel self-doubt and training managers to help employees navigate impostor feelings.
Others pushed for actions explicitly designed to:
- support and advance female employees, for example, by promoting professional women’s networks
- making an organizational commitment to daycare
- conducting in-house training programs for promising employees who need to build their confidence, and
- establishing a formal or informal mentor system
Thirty years later, initiatives aimed at so-called high potentials, employee resource groups, and others are now widely accepted practices.
Still, there’s much more to be done.
This includes organizations finding ways to normalize impostor syndrome by making talking about impostor syndrome both an acceptable and expected part of the cultural conversation.
One company normalized it by adding to their job postings: We understand the confidence gap and impostor syndrome are real. We want you to apply.
Normalizing is also done by making employees and management aware of how organizational culture unrelated to bias can also contribute to impostor syndrome, as well as occupational, situational, societal, and familial sources.
This alone can help employees do less psychologizing and more contextualizing.
Addressing impostor syndrome in organizations also means ensuring employees and managers have the information, insight, and practical tools they need to help themselves and others “unlearn” impostor syndrome by becoming what I refer to as a Humble Realist™.
What I wrote in 1996 stands today:
The Impostor Syndrome, although experienced on an individual level, can and does interfere with the job effectiveness, productivity and advancement potential of those encumbered by it. This should be of great concern to managers because it affects a company’s greatest resource — its employees.
