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I don’t think I am ready for this role.
I don’t think I am the right person for the job.
What if I’m asked this question and I don’t know the answer?
I am intimidated by my colleagues’ confidence.
What if they find me out?
Are those thoughts familiar? They might have arisen when you started a challenge, a new job, or a specific leadership position for the first time? Do they keep coming back even though you could readily point to a body of evidence refuting their negative perspective? Such thoughts are particularly associated with the phenomenon that is termed Imposter Syndrome, and you would not be on your own in contemplating them. Even though the feelings and thought patterns seem so personal and unique, most of us, at some stage, have experienced it.
I want to build on our blog post from last week by positively reframing Imposter Syndrome to accept that it is part of the journey in becoming an effective leader. We need to understand that it is a naturally occurring phenomenon which is a direct result of our evolutionary biology. Professor Steve Peters, in his book The Chimp Paradox, explains that our ‘inner chimp’ has an emotional reaction to changed circumstances, which sparks the fight, flight or freeze reaction. As a survival mechanism, it is overridingly powerful, and one we still live with today (Peters, 2015, pp. 15-19, p.27). Human logic is a more modern overlay on our brain circuitry, what Peters refers to as ‘the computer’, which wrestles with the chimp for control over our mind when confronted with life-changing events (Peters, 2015, pp. 21-22). Imposter syndrome, therefore, is when the chimp emotionally charges your reaction to move into flight or freeze, and human logic cannot make a breakthrough. As a biological reaction, we cannot escape it, but there are things we can do to work with it. (Peters, 2015, p.43).
In reference to leadership, Jim Collins and his team in the book Good to Great concluded that great companies could be distinguished from good companies by the type of leader at the helm. They coined the term ‘Level 5 Leadership’ for those outstanding men and women who shared qualities of personal humility, modesty and ferocious resolve (Collins, 2001, p. 30). From my perspective, you do not espouse humility and modesty without being self-critical and contemplating what I identified at the very beginning of this article. Collins referred to Level 5 Leaders as people who would look out of the window to apportion credit but look in the mirror to apportion blame and assume responsibility (Collins, 2001, p. 35). During this process, often at a significant moment in their career, you can imagine the thoughts that would be swirling in their mind.
What did I do that could have been better?
How could I have further served those around me?
What must I change about myself?
Leading to.......
Am I the right person for this role and this company?
Have I been found out?
What do these statements and questions appear synonymous with?
To juxtapose the Level 5 Leaders, Collins and his team were equally clear that absence of “gargantuan ego” was what separated this outstanding group from other forms of effective and ineffective leadership (Collins, 2001, p. 29). By default, leaders with gargantuan egos are generally poor at self-reflection, if they partake in it all. Personal analysis and entertaining negative thoughts interfere with the narrative they have built around their leadership. Therefore, for them, the process and the outcome are redundant, and an imposter will not be found within their mind.
If we follow this logic, Imposter Syndrome can, therefore, be positively reframed as a continual process that ensures you take a health-check on your ego to remain grounded, humble and modest. Collins stresses that his research did not extend to what created a Level 5 Leader and referred to this outstanding group’s inner development as an impenetrable “black box” consisting of a combination of unseen magic ingredients we may eventually be able to discern and imitate (Collins, 2001, p.37). However, through experience and perception, I would hypothesise that this black box has a matrix board where transistors and capacitors regularly crackle with the electrified thoughts stimulated by metacognitive processes similar to that seen with Imposter Syndrome.
Yet, we haven’t addressed ferocious resolve as the final component of Level 5 Leadership. How does one who experiences Imposter Syndrome develop that? It seems an impossible leap if you are racked with self-doubt. Jim Collins in Good to Great posits that “the capability resides within them (all potential leaders)...buried and ignored...(but) under the right circumstances – self-reflection, conscious personal development, a mentor, a great teacher...you can begin to develop” (Collins, 2001, p.37). We also come full circle to Professor Steve Peters’ view that the computer, or human logic, can be programmed to excise gremlins and goblins from the system and render it powerful enough to override our emotional chimp (Peters, 2015, pp. 90-107).
In my view, the best ‘conscious personal development’ to accentuate human logic is effective professional coaching. Regular coaching sessions are a highly effective method in facilitating deep self-reflection to neutralise the fear and self-doubt that paralyses potential Level 5 Leaders. Effective professional coaches will assist you on a journey to recalibrate your beliefs, values and attitudes to build habits, behaviours, methodologies and strategies to become the best version of yourself. You will be empowered to seek, design and enact your own solutions and arrive at a point where fear can transform into ferocious resolve.
So, do you want to stay crippled with self-doubt for the rest of your life? Dr. Pippa Grange, in her book ‘Fear Less’ is certain that the fear ‘about not being good enough... (can) cause much of your suffering and get in the way of your fulfilment’ (Grange, 2021, p.97). Not doing anything about it or trying to change it on your own might be more difficult than you realise. Plato knew this 2,500 years ago when he wrote in Republic that "lazy minds are wont to feast themselves on their own thoughts when they walk alone" (Book 5, p. 458a). Coincidentally, feasting alone upon your own thoughts is what fuels the debilitating spiralling negativity of Imposter Syndrome rather than making it work for you as the basis of a virtuous self-reflective cycle.
Come join us at KCM 80-20 if you would like to discuss how we can help you positively reframe the self-doubt that exists within you and realise your potential. Please subscribe to the blog to receive our articles directly.
References
Collins, J. (2001). Good to Great. Random House Publishing.
Grange, P. (2021). Fear Less. Vermillion.
Peters, S. (2015). The Chimp Paradox. Vermillion.
Plato. Republic. https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/textdoc=Perseus%3Atext% 3A1999.01.0168%3 Abook%3D5%3Asection%3D458a. Accessed 23 March 2023.
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