The Imposter Phenomenon

Guy Bloom interviews Kate Atkin, a speaker, facilitator, author, and author of The Imposter Phenomenon. They explore Kate's journey from a farming background to becoming an expert in the field, discussing the differences between the imposter phenomenon and imposter syndrome, the role of external validation, and the impact of societal expectations. Kate shares insights from her research on coping strategies and emphasizes the importance of psychological courage in overcoming imposter feelings. 

The conversation concludes with practical advice for leaders on how to support their teams in recognizing their worth and capabilities.

Takeaways

• The imposter phenomenon is not limited to women.
• It's important to differentiate between a phenomenon and a syndrome.
• External validation can be both helpful and harmful.
• Coping strategies can sometimes be maladaptive.
• Normalizing failure can help reduce imposter feelings.
• Psychological courage is necessary to accept one's abilities.
• The environment can influence feelings of belonging.
• Parenting styles can impact self-perception and imposter feelings.
• Self-handicapping behaviors can serve as excuses for underperformance.
• Leaders should provide evidence of why their team members are amazing, not just accolades.

👉 Kate’s book The Imposter Phenomenon is available on Amazon
👉 Find Kate at https://kateatkin.com
👉 Connect on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kateatkin/

🔔 Subscribe for more conversations with leading thinkers on leadership, confidence, and personal growth. 

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Imposter Phenomenon
04:45 Kate's Origin Story and Journey
09:53 Understanding the Imposter Phenomenon vs. Syndrome
19:42 The Role of Internal and External Validation
24:36 The Impact of Environment on Imposter Feelings
29:25 Dunning-Kruger Effect vs. Imposter Feelings
32:01 The Psychological Roots of Imposter Feelings
44:04 Coping Strategies and Moving Forward
50:19 The Role of Courage in Overcoming Imposter Feelings
56:26 Final Thoughts on Leadership and Validation

To find out more about Guy Bloom and his award winning work in Team Coaching, Leadership Development and Executive Coaching click below.

The link to everything CLICK HERE
UK: 07827 953814
Email: guybloom@livingbrave.com
Web: www.livingbrave.com

Transcript

Guy Bloom (00:00)
So Kate, it is absolutely lovely to have you on this episode of Leadership Bytes. Welcome.

Kate Atkin (00:06)
Thank you, thanks for inviting me Guy.

Guy Bloom (00:08)
Well, ⁓ I start every episode the same way, rather tediously or rather brilliantly, I'm never quite sure, rather than do a convoluted introduction. If somebody met you at a social gathering and said, Kate, what do you do for a living then? What would you say?

Kate Atkin (00:26)
It's one of those things when I say it, could be a conversation stopper to be honest, because if I tell you what I do, which is being a speaker, facilitator, author and researcher on the imposter phenomenon, and most people go, the what?

Guy Bloom (00:40)
Brilliant. That's just spot on. listen, I'm very invested in this topic. A lot of people know at this point that I do leadership development. So this whole topic and the vocabulary around it and the accepted vernacular, so to speak, is quite interesting. So we'll get into that. You have a book called The Impostor Phenomenon, which is available on Amazon. And of course, I'm going to link.

to it. Let's jump ⁓ in with actually just before we get to the book, think knowing somebody's journey helps to understand what it is that they're offering and where they're coming at it from. So it would be I think useful to just get a sense of I just did a podcast earlier this morning.

and Lady Corp. Meta said, I'll give you my origin story. And I quite liked that phrase. So I think that's the way to go. Give us your origin story, Kate.

Kate Atkin (01:47)
All right, so my origin story starts.

with a farming background in rural Lincolnshire. So being the middle one of three girls and had I been born a boy I would have been called Eric. Now I didn't pop out a boy but I am also the one that failed this wonderful exam back in the 1970s that we took to say if you were academic and clever and you went to the grammar school or if you were deemed to be practical you went to the local secondary modern and out of my

sisters I'm the only one that failed it. So I went to the local secondary modern school, they both went off to the grammar school. So my head internalised this sort of subliminal message of not being academic, not being clever and absolutely not university material. So I went to, I'll try and keep this short as an origin story, but I went to Norwich City College and did an HND in business studies which

Guy Bloom (02:23)
than plus.

That's great.

Kate Atkin (02:44)
Subsequently, I've been told Stanford has no degree. So I sort of passed through life sort of feeling not quite good enough, started work for Barclays Bank and moved on to their training team. Loved it.

left that and started out on my own in the year 2000 and have been speaking, facilitating and training as a freelancer for the last 25 years. But in 2009, I married my husband, met him a year before that. And it was about three years later when he encouraged me to do something that I never thought I would do. And he suggested in 2012 that I applied to the University of East London to do a master's in positive science.

psychology.

I sort of fell through the floor a bit at that point because all of my insecurities bubbled to the surface of I can't do that, I don't even have a first degree, the university won't want me, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But he helped me to write my personal statement and to my surprise, the University of East London let me in and everybody else, all my friends, they go, well, of course they did, Kate. And I excused it as the fact that they obviously just want another student fee. I delayed my entrance by 12 months because I didn't know enough, although I've been interested in the topic of

psychology for years and this was on positive psychology. So really interesting topic, something that I have read around over the years, but I still didn't feel like I knew enough. So 12 months later, I turn up at university for the first time in my life at university in my late 40s. And my fellow students naturally say, what's your first degree in? And I'm going, I don't have one. And they're surprised. Oh, they let

do a Masters without a first degree even heightened this sense of insecurity and of not belonging although I didn't have a name for it at that particular point and it was really unsettling really really stressful and within the first semester

I came across by chance Pauline Clance and Suzanne Ime's research on the imposter phenomenon. And as I read their 1978 journal article, I was just feeling like I'm ticking all the boxes. I'm reading about me. They talk about the middle child. They talk about, ⁓ you know, where these feelings come from, the parenting styles, et cetera, et cetera, and the impact that it has and the high stress that it can cause. Now, their research was titled in high achieving women.

But we'll come on to that because it's not technically just women and we'll I'm sure we'll delve into that. So I'm going to fast forward a little bit now. You'll be pleased to hear because that's sort of like the origin story. And it led me then to want to know more about this topic and to realize that people had, yes, since 1978 done a little bit of research, but I was really surprised after my masters to discover that nobody had researched coping strategies. So in 2017, that led me down another rabbit hole for a further

those six plus years.

Guy Bloom (05:47)
Wow. There you go. Stick that in your pipe. So, ⁓ on the front of the book, so there'll be an image going up for those that are watching it, it... ⁓

has a person with a, is it like a micado mask, a kind of Japanese micado mask, and I'll get to the title in just a second, but it's somebody, you know, who's taking or holding a mask to their face and why you feel like a fraud and what to do about it. But here's the interesting thing for anybody that's not looking right now on a video.

is says the imposter and then the word syndrome is crossed out and it says phenomenon so the title of the book is the imposter phenomenon now i think that's just in essence a great starting point because it is referred to in general parlance as imposter syndrome so it would be great just to kind of let's jump in there let's let's get right into the the root of this why is syndrome crossed out

Kate Atkin (06:54)
Yeah, and I think that's a callback to how I introduced myself and why I said sometimes it's showstopper because if I say I'm a speaker, you know, researcher on the imposter syndrome, most people will go, yeah, I've heard of that. But technically it isn't a syndrome. So I really struggle to say I'm a speaker researcher on the imposter syndrome because it's not, it's a phenomenon. Excuse me, just got a little frog. And.

So the phenomenon, when we look at it back in 1978, Clancy and Iames used that term. People felt like a fraud on the inside, but the external evidence was successful. So it's being successful despite this inner feeling of being a feeling like a fraud. So the external evidence says that you can do all of this, but inside you haven't accepted. But it occurs at certain points in time.

So a phenomenon is this occurrence at certain points, so it might be in certain meetings, it might be with certain people. It might be for some people at work all of the time and not at home, and for others it can be the flip of that coin. It can be, you know, parenting style, you know, and their capabilities as a parent. But at work, they're absolutely fine. So it varies from person to person, and it varies from situation to situation.

If we use the term syndrome, we're putting a pathological stamp to these feelings. And there's some researchers now calling for the imposter syndrome to be put into the DSM. I think there's enough there in the DSM. We do not need another mental health issue to deal with. And although these feelings can very much trigger high levels of anxiety for people, if you feel them internally,

intensely or and frequently, in and of itself it's not a mental health condition. So it's something that's felt at certain points in time, but it's also felt. Some people will experience this and I don't use the term suffer from, that's the other thing about semantics, syndrome, phenomenon and suffer or experience. And it's felt a little bit by quite a lot of people.

Not quite everybody, but I would say a lot of people would feel this a little bit at certain points throughout their working lives. It's felt a lot.

by a number of people and that a lot by a number of people that number is under question from research that's been done back in the 1980s indicating maybe 80 percent of 70 percent rather of people will experience that more recent research indicates it might be as much as 80 percent but they've also included those people who feel it a moderate amount of time so

it's one of those things that you can't quite grasp and say it's definitely this hence phenomenon being that better term.

Guy Bloom (09:53)
Right, so I want to be, well I don't have to try very hard, I'd like to be a bit gaunt and ask a few naive questions, not because I'm sitting with a pre-ordained perspective, but because I just want to make sense of the fact that I knew it as imposter syndrome, not imposter phenomenon. So I am just, I'm literally using this conversation to help me navigate. if I go left instead of right, please forgive me and you can pull me back, which is.

What if I was going to say that somebody would, when I say somebody, the general population at some point form in their life will feel some sort of doubt, uncertainty, anxiety at some point about inverted commas stuff. Now, if there was a volume control on that.

some people it might be very contextual. I'm absolutely fine in places A, B, C and D ⁓ but in that context, in that situation, I have a doubt and an uncertainty and an anxiety.

I imagine, he says, not actually knowing at all, but never let the facts get in way of a good supposition, which is, I presume that there will be people that will have very singular doubts on very singular contexts, and there will be others, if there's a distribution curve, that have a considerable amount of doubts about a considerable amount of things. Now, the root cause might be an inherent doubt. I could...

understand that or they might be maybe they're younger so there's a lot of things that they haven't done yet or who knows. So what is the difference between a phenomenon or the imposter inverted commas topic?

Just being doubtful, uncertain, not sure yet.

Kate Atkin (11:42)
really good question. Yeah.

The key difference is the external evidence.

So when you have self-doubt and you are, let's say from leadership perspective, so you've got a new leadership role. So let's just suppose somebody's moved into a new leadership role. Now, if it's their first leadership role, I would suggest that levels of self-doubt ought to be there because they haven't got experience of being a leader. So that is what I would term normal and healthy self-doubt because you don't have that external track record.

Guy Bloom (11:58)
Mm-hmm.

Kate Atkin (12:21)
You have got knowledge, skills and abilities, which is why you've been given that new leadership role or promoted into it or whatever. But when you have a new leadership role and it is one, perhaps it's your third, either in the same organization or a different organization, you've already got a track record of experience as a leader.

you would still have an element of what I term normal healthy self-doubt because maybe you've got a new team, you don't know all of the people, you don't know the organization and the hierarchy, you're getting your feet under the table let's say. So for the first six months most people would experience some level of self-doubt which is a good thing because it can prevent arrogance and hubris.

But if this level of self-doubt continues and perpetuates, when you've already got that track record, after about six months, I think a lot of people find they've got their feet under the table, they've settled into the new role, they generally know the lay of the land. Then if that self-doubt perpetuates, that's when I would suggest people start to look at, hmm, is it imposter style self-doubt? ⁓

Guy Bloom (13:34)
So just for me to calibrate and hopefully help others, it would be right and normal unless you're basically a sociopath or just, you know, not literally paying attention at all, to walk through life having moments where you feel unsure.

I may know how to do it but I've never done it for this many people or etc etc. So there's lots of times when it would be healthy and normal and a good indicator that you need to have your wits about you that you have an element of uncertainty or doubt. It would show a level of self-reflection I haven't done this before or whatever that might be. If I now have evidence that says actually

All the indicators tell you by anybody else's version of good, if you were looking at somebody else, you would ordain them as being capable, maybe not the best in the world, but of a level, but you can't ordain yourself. You can't credit yourself with that confidence that you would credit somebody else. Then we're in that position of it being the imposter phenomenon.

Kate Atkin (14:37)
Yeah, that's that

I think is a very good summary. And as you say about ordaining it to yourself, it's actually really interesting because other people are most likely to have told you how good you are. You will have just gone.

yeah but they're just saying that yeah but you know i don't feel it on the inside or yeah but and you've pushed it away rather than updated the view of yourself and and for me failing the 11 plus exam stuck with me sort of not necessarily even consciously but stayed with me for quite a long

Guy Bloom (14:57)
You're deflecting it, negating it. ⁓

Kate Atkin (15:13)
time about this sense of not being good enough but also this desire then to make sure I am good enough to push forward to be perfect and to get things done correctly.

Guy Bloom (15:28)
When I'm talking to people on programs or one-to-one coaching, I talk about the difference between internal and external validation, which is if I externally validate, I'm at the whim of the world. The world has to tell me how I'm doing.

So social media would be a classic thing of if you have, it can be older people as well, but if you are looking for likes, then actually you're not valid until you've got likes or views or whatever. So if you internally validate, but you don't externally validate, that usually means you're a bit of a lunatic. You know, I think I'm awesome, but I don't look to the outside world. I just think I'm fabulous.

Kate Atkin (16:12)
Mm-hmm.

Guy Bloom (16:13)
I

meet quite a few of those where we have to have a bit of a sit-down and go yeah some sort of external calibration would be quite good. However, so this is where the idea of you're not giving yourself the

the ability to internally validate. You are externally calibrating, but there's some sort of disconnect between, for a lot of people, I can see that I'm doing well, I'm being told I'm doing well, I'm looking to the outside, therefore I grow in confidence, which means even when something negative happens, I have enough external data points to know that actually that might be your interpretation, or actually I may have done a good job, but it's just

not the flavor that you're looking for, because actually I have a hundred points of positivity and this is one of negativity, therefore it doesn't send me into a spiral because I look to the evidence. That would be reasonable. know, one piece of negative feedback doesn't send you down the rabbit hole. Twenty pieces of negative feedback, you may have to have a word with yourself and see what's what.

but the break here is where the external calibration is not feeding the internal validation.

Kate Atkin (17:31)
And for my PhD, which was on the coping strategies, I interviewed 21 people, which was that other, you know, six plus years post my masters. And that's sort of really what.

meant that the book came about is to look at, nobody's really going to read the PhD thesis, it is there online if you want to, but it's really making it much more accessible. And many of those 21 participants were telling me that that external validation from people was excruciatingly difficult to hear. They'd rather crawl under the table than get positive feedback was one person's example. So we think we're giving people

Guy Bloom (18:10)
Hmm.

Kate Atkin (18:14)
the validation that they need to give their confidence a boost and I think what would be really useful guys is to unpick what we mean by confidence and then separate that out from imposter feelings as well and I also want to refer back to your comment about the mask too so there's lots of things already that I'm sort of noting to say it'd be really good to discuss a little bit more on but that the external validation when it doesn't meet with your self-perception

Guy Bloom (18:32)
Yeah.

Kate Atkin (18:42)
we look for self-deception, in other words we deceive ourselves, we don't believe what somebody else is telling us and we think that our perception of ourselves is correct. So anything that doesn't meet with our self-perception we're going to push away.

So that one piece of negative feedback that you said that doesn't send people into a spiral, for people with imposter feelings, that one piece of negative feedback may well send people into a spiral because they don't have that sure sense of how good they really are.

Guy Bloom (19:19)
be fair to say so is again I'm trying to align my my language with yours just to make sure I'm keeping up with the main party so it's there is something here that would say the inner dialogue that internal narrative where you're commenting to yourself or having that conversation with your yourself ⁓ that's the bit that is

I guess going on for people who are very positive and confident versus those that are not. Their internal representation, the way that they identify themselves and speak of themselves. Did that kind of internal narrative, does that play a part in what you're seeing or hearing when you did that research?

Kate Atkin (20:02)
Yes, yes. So the internal narrative does. And there is something about the external environment as well. So I don't want to say it's all about the internal narrative because it isn't. And there's a little bit about the media. So coming back to this phenomenon syndrome, conundrum, back in, I don't remember now when it was, but 2000 and something, Sheryl Sandberg published Lean In, might have been 2008 or thereabouts. And

she referred to imposter syndrome. That wasn't the very first reference to it but I think really the term syndrome took off then and most people then have heard of imposter syndrome. From the narrative perspective and I'm trying to think what rabbit hole I was sending myself down at that point but it's this internal conversation that you're having.

So yes, there's something about that internal conversation, but there's also something about the external environment and the media have picked upon syndrome because it's quite a sexy term. It's easy to say, it's an attention grabber and...

Guy Bloom (21:14)
Hmm.

Kate Atkin (21:15)
there have been lots of people going, woe is me, I've got the imposter syndrome, where in fact they're doing something new for the first time, they're stretching their comfort zones. That is not imposter feelings. That is normal, healthy self doubt. Phenomenon is a much harder word to spell, say. And so it's not got that sexy connotation. So I think the media chosen to ignore the fact that it is really a phenomenon, not a syndrome.

and the external environment. So yes, it is something to do with some of the internal messages that we have, but sometimes the external environment is feeding those internal messages. in some situations, again, let's say a leadership, let's take because of being on the Leadership Bytes podcast, let's take leadership as an example. And let's say you're going into an organization for the first time, but it's this amazing building, know, the just walk,

Guy Bloom (21:56)
reinforcing it.

Kate Atkin (22:15)
in through the front door, finding there's the security desk, you've got to go up let's say to the eighth floor or maybe higher and you've got all of this sort of nuance about the environment around you isn't conducive to helping you feel as if you belong. And so some of it is internal narrative, some of it is external environment and yeah we can continue to to unpick a bit more about that.

Guy Bloom (22:42)
Yeah, so the environment

and all the reaction on the behaviour of others would be observable data. would make me have a response to it, which would feed into that inner dialogue. Do I belong here? Look how imposing everything is, you know, those kind of things.

Kate Atkin (22:56)
Well, people, the response to people.

Yeah, the response to people generally is, know, you're really good at what you do. You're great. Really nice to have you here. Welcome. You're expecting great things of you. And inside, people may be going, can I do this? Externally, they will appear very confident and very competent. It's the internal anxieties that could be at play. And we don't know about it. And that's the other thing about imposter phenomenon. But say, well, how can I spot it if I'm leading a team?

Guy Bloom (23:13)
Yeah, of course.

Kate Atkin (23:31)
do I spot it in others? Absolutely sometimes you cannot, it can be so well hidden.

Guy Bloom (23:38)
So there's something there about having a psychologically safe environment where actually your role is to make an environment where the unseen may be offered to you because actually I feel safe to do so. Now, you see, just picking up on the media as well, just going back to what you were saying, I think there is something there about the word depressed narcissist. I've got autism. My little boy's got autism, right? But apparently everybody else has got it as well.

You know, it's one of those classic things where there's those that have it and those that have an element that they can align and identify as being, well, that sounds like an autistic trait and they like, it's almost performative. It allows them to feel connected to a thing and it can be an excuse for a thing as well. And there is probably again, because, you know, we're human beings, it might be genuine, but it might be not, you know, depressed or just feeling a bit rubbish.

You know, the language itself is so heavily laden with meaning that if you're not careful, the adoption of it is in itself its own issue. And I'm just interested in, I wonder if...

actually at one end there are people that have things that are definitively fitting into this space and people kind of adopt it as a get out of jail free card for actually doing some hard work and some reflection because it suits them to actually have the thing.

Kate Atkin (25:11)
So with imposter feelings, there is that continuum, as I mentioned, and some people have just a really little light touch or maybe not at all, and other people have really intense imposter feelings. So as with many things, as you've just alluded, there is a continuum and it depends on whereabouts on that continuum, one of those continuums that you fall. ⁓ But.

Guy Bloom (25:35)
Easy for you to say.

Kate Atkin (25:40)
There's a number of things that I'd want to have that opportunity to unpick with you because when you don't experience it at all, so you mentioned earlier on, think you alluded to narcissists, I can't remember what other language you used, it might have been sociopaths, but.

Guy Bloom (25:55)
Yeah, people that are depressed or people that have autism

or any label you like really.

Kate Atkin (26:00)
Well, no, I'm just thinking about imposter feelings at the moment rather than just broadened. the if you don't experience imposter feelings, you can have a normal, healthy sense of what you can do and what you can't do. And that is actually really good, really good to know. I know I can do this. I know I'm good at this and I know I can't do that. And maybe using Carol Dweck's work, I know I can't do that yet. You know, if it's something that you want to learn, but it's.

It's the sense of if you think you can do something but you don't have the external evidence and you believe in your head you can do it then we're talking about something different which will be the Dunning-Kruger effect. You know I believe I can do anything you know look at me I'm great at whatever I turn my hand to you know that is more delusional.

as well saying, know, so this sense of delusion of your own capabilities of being so great as opposed to not having the evidence. So the Dunning-Kruger effect is probably the flip opposite to imposter feelings, the imposter.

Guy Bloom (27:06)
Yeah, you don't know, you're

so ignorant on the topic that you all your own observations that you have no frame of reference for what good is. Therefore you are not yourself with a certain level of competence that you don't actually have. Yeah. Whereas this is actually you have evidence that tells you you're very capable and competent to some degree or some level, even if it's just for the level that you're at. It may not be that you're as competent as you're going to get, but if it's your first week, you know,

Kate Atkin (27:16)
You just believe you can do anything.

Guy Bloom (27:34)
where you're supposed to be and actually you can be competent for that moment at the level that you're operating at but you you're not willing to take on board the the evidence. here's a... gone.

Kate Atkin (27:45)
Yeah, so if you.

I was going say, if you imagine a graph and you've got the high level of self belief that I can do anything, but the external evidence is very low, that's the Dunning-Kruger. If you've got high levels of external evidence that you can do something, but the internal belief is very low, that's the imposter phenomenon. What I would really like for people, as you mentioned there about if it's your first week, you're going to be on this trajectory, which is this line as your experience grows.

should your internal sense of your experience grow alongside that and that's the best thing. With confidence the other interesting thing to mention is that you can feel confident about your capability to do something. So this I know I can do this thing whatever that thing is because I've had the past experience so you can feel confident about doing something but you can still have the imposter feelings which goes yeah but what if this time you make a mess of it.

What if this time it doesn't work out the way you want? And that can still cause imposter style anxiety. And interestingly, it causes more often than not overwork rather than pulling back from doing the work. So it maybe leads to people burning out within organizations.

Guy Bloom (29:02)
Hmm.

So I will come back to that, but I just suddenly thought, and probably out of sequence for our conversation, but is there ever a time when you would call it a syndrome? Or is it no, it's just the wrong word?

Kate Atkin (29:24)
for me. ⁓

No, I would not call it a syndrome at all. It is the wrong word. When you are experiencing intense imposter feelings, which I did when I was doing my masters and I took the Klantz imposter phenomenon scale, ⁓ which is a researched ⁓ calibrated scale to be able to identify imposter feelings. Now I'm using the word identify. I'm not using the word diagnose again, very, very carefully not using that.

I was really high up on that scale.

Those feelings of anxiety could have been classed as clinical, perhaps, anxiety because of my imposter feelings. But I wouldn't have classed the imposter feelings as the syndrome mental health condition, but you could potentially class the anxiety as something. And so from the perspective of high sense of anxiety, so much so for me personally, I've had excruciating stomach aches over the years, really bad.

where I've been crippled up, doubled up, lying on the bed, and then the adrenaline kicks in and you perform and you get really great feedback and then the adrenaline lessens and your anxiety can come back in again, was it really that good? But without knowing it, and so my understanding of the imposter feelings has actually helped me manage my own anxiety, but I would separate the two out rather than it being...

Guy Bloom (30:55)
Hmm.

Kate Atkin (30:58)
imposter syndrome. I personally would say absolutely not the phenomenon it's the certain points in time. Yeah. Yeah, very yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Guy Bloom (31:01)
So the word syndrome, from your frame, it's less than helpful. It's an overly simplistic way of me saying it, but it's just less than helpful for a whole... it labels, it indicates other factors,

it draws in a language that probably, etc. Okay.

Kate Atkin (31:18)
And it means, as you said

earlier, it means people sometimes when you've got the label, you can play up to the label. You know, it's the worries me I've got the imposter syndrome. It's like, no, we experienced this phenomenon at certain points, but there are, it also takes away, if you've got a syndrome, it becomes this pathological to condition that needs a treatment and it takes away your own agency of doing something about it. Now, as I mentioned earlier, there are situations that you can find yourselves in where it's the external environment that

Guy Bloom (31:23)
Yeah.

Kate Atkin (31:47)
be triggering the imposter feelings but a lot of the time also there is that internal thinking that you alluded to earlier that we can do something about it.

Guy Bloom (31:59)
does.

Does the imposter phenomenon have any connection to...

any form of psychological frame of reference that I don't have the words for that would say, for example, it may not be imposter syndrome, but if you're experiencing or identifying the imposter phenomenon,

because you are not able to easily, for whatever reason, take on board the data that tells you that actually, in fact, you yourself identify it, you know what it is, but you can't turn that into something that allows you to confirm to yourself that you are of a level or operating in a certain way. Is that then linked to...

another form of a psychological, I don't want to use the word issue, that's a terrible word for me to use but I just recognise I don't have a better one to hand, a psychological frame perhaps that would be identified or, because otherwise, in essence, why is that happening?

Kate Atkin (33:10)
Now, I'm not sure, because you said about a psychological thing that you didn't have the words for, quite what you're asking, if I'm honest.

Guy Bloom (33:19)
Well, okay, if

you're, if you're, if you are, for example you're bulimic, you have a psychological, identifiable psychological phenomenon, topic going on that could be identified because you look in the mirror and you see or you identify in your internal languages. So it would be identified as a psychological, I'm just going to use the word issue, even though I don't mean that in nasty way, a psychological issue.

and then there could be a whole host of interventions that could help somebody move themselves away from that problem. If you're ⁓ experiencing the imposter phenomenon, would it be fair to say, and by the way I'm not holding a position, I'm just asking the question, would it be fair to say that actually there is a psychological issue? Because actually if...

because otherwise the majority of people can. They can see the data and they can internalise it and go, OK, I may not ordain myself as being brilliant, but I'm clearly not bad at it. They're at least able to go some way forward. So what is preventing? What is the prevention? What is the barrier? What is the hurdle? Not what they're experiencing, but where's that coming from? What's the root of that?

Kate Atkin (34:39)
Okay, so there's a couple of things there. One point when you said the majority of people will be able to look at that external evidence and go, yeah, okay, I'm not mad at that. I wonder if that is truly the majority of people.

because research indicates that it might not be. Particularly now we've got social media where we're finding people are looking at others that are, you know, oh, I'm comparing myself to others much more easily and finding other people better than me. So even though I've got the evidence, it's still not quite good enough for me to believe myself. Some of it, if we think about where it might come from.

from a psychological perspective, some of it is for some people, parenting styles, some of it is for some people, their childhood messages. So that could be where, let's say, I'll use an example of you come out from primary school and you've got eight out of 10 in your spelling test and you proudly come home and the immediate thing that you're asked is, which two did you get wrong? And that...

sort of means that we may internalize the, I've got to be perfect to have my parents love me. And so that could be a subtle way of internalizing that sense of needing to be perfect. So that's definitely correlated with imposter feelings that must be perfect.

There's also the hyper supportive parent, which one of my clients, bless her, has experienced and told me about in a conversation that we had prior to me speaking at her event in London a few years ago. And she said her mama told her that she could do anything, and she'd be great at whatever she chose to do, which you think is really lovely to encourage your children. And then she failed her first driving test.

And she realized that she wasn't great at everything and it flawed her. So psychologically, she didn't know how to cope with failure. And a conversation I've had with another person on imposter feelings who recognized that she didn't experience them at all was about the way her mother had parented her.

And it was to understand that actually the discussion was around what have you failed at today, as well as what have you learned. So normalizing failures and experiences and things that didn't go so well.

and recognizing their learning opportunities rather than failures. So parenting styles, part of it. ⁓ Societal messages, part of it. Cultural messages, part of it. ⁓ I can remember growing up in Lincolnshire in probably early to mid 20s was constantly being asked by people about, when are you courting? Have you not got married yet? And all of those sorts of conversations.

was that you would marry, that you would then have children and that was just the expectation in that environment.

⁓ and instead you go off and have a career and that's not what's expected. So you've done something beyond what was expected. That can be another reason for imposter feelings to surface because the societal or organisational expectations have been such and you've done something different. And then just thinking about other reasons, know, when there's no light role model. So you get into a leadership.

position and you and I guy are both white. You know there's there's an aspect of if you're not white or you have a different sexual orientation or you're neurodiverse or you know a number of other things and you see yourself as being other.

then that could be one of the reasons for imposter feelings because you haven't got a role model that looks like you or has the same background as you, et cetera. And one of my research participants and other people have also had this sort of level of conversation with me about it's not just to do with those under the EDI, if you want to use that term, the protected characteristics, it's also in a very simplistic way.

Feeling that you don't belong because for me, failed the 11 plus, what am I doing at university? For others it can be, what am I doing working in the city of London because I was brought up in a council house in the north of England? So it can be a sense of not belonging, but there's also a sense of who you see yourself as being. And I think that bit is where you were going early on in the psychological framework.

and this sense of who do you think you are? And some of that, that particular phrase, it's like, ooh, who does she think she is? know, who do you think you are doing good? And that sort of comment can, for some people, be really detrimental, but it can also be a refrain in your own head. But there's also a sense of who do you think you are doing this? Do you think you belong? Do you think you should do it? And I was the shy child. Out of the three of us, you know, I got the shy label, and I'm the one that speaks for a living.

So it's a really interesting conundrum and there's a work and research done by Albert Bandura that talks on this sense of self-deception and it will perpetuate until you get enough evidence that means in the end you have to accept the external evidence and change the self-perception.

And if I'll continue just in this answer for a tiny bit longer, because for me, the biggest realization was actually on a train having spoken at Oxford University at an event. I was on the train back to Cambridge, but going via London because you dip in and dip out. And it took a little while. And I was pondering on a conversation that I'd had with one of the attendees who'd said to me, surely she knows herself better than everybody else with this sort of assumption of surely I'm right about me.

Well, I wouldn't argue with the fact that she knows herself better than everybody else, but when we know ourselves, we know ourselves subjectively. The warts and all are there, not objectively with what other people see, and which is actually a clearer perception, the objective evidence. And one of my biggest aha moments came on that train journey back was if I continue to believe myself,

over and above everybody else. My intention is to stay humble but what I am actually doing by believing myself over and above everybody else is going I know myself better which is more arrogant which is what you're trying to avoid and that's how I ended up flipping my narrative into allowing the external evidence in on the inside.

Guy Bloom (41:30)
Hmm. Okay. I get a sense that there's...

There's a lot of frame, you every person has a frame of reference on the world. And it feels as if that there's many roots to being, you know, my truth is not your truth, that kind of thing. Which is to say it's very hard to understand how one person has a pretty terrible childhood for various reasons and goes on and becomes an incredibly strong personality in the world. But the same circumstance.

There's actually somebody that lives just a few roads away, two brothers. One's a drug, well he's just passed away unfortunately, he's been a drug addict all of his life. One is a successful businessman. Same parents, two years apart, same school, they're at school together. One goes down one path, one goes down another. Now, of course, just because they're brothers doesn't mean they've had the same experiences. That's not what I mean.

but at the same time, it does get to a point where you go, in some respects, it probably doesn't matter how you got here. It's what you're going to do moving forward. And that's not true. It can be very powerful to understand some of the mechanisms that have triggered certain things so you can make sense of them. But actually, if we were then going to say, okay, 100 different people have probably got to where they are for 100 different reasons.

If you had an auditorium full of people and they were all there listening to you because they had these feelings

you unless you're going to become the psychotherapist, which is not your role is you're not going to sit down and over the next two or three years find out, you your mum locked you in a cupboard when you were three and that's, you know, that's where it came from. So root cause analysis can be interesting, but also who's maybe always got time for it. And it's only your interpretation of the experience you've had as an observer. They may have seen and interpret that differently. So when we talk about coping mechanisms,

or corrective measures or moving forward or let's just kind of segue into that space. What is the general everybody's different? One part of clothing doesn't fit everybody the same way. But when you're working with advising, giving commentary to people, what's the general approach for you of to get a grip of this, to make headway with it, to step forward? How do you move into that space with people?

Kate Atkin (44:04)
Yeah, so just pick up on that.

word of psychotherapist that you used a moment ago, because I wouldn't necessarily recommend if you feel like an imposter that you need to go down the therapy route, because again, we're not pathologising it. There are some people who have the sense of anxiety, and in fact, a number of my participants told me that they had experienced therapy for levels of anxiety or depression or whatever reason, and it can be hugely helpful. So I absolutely take that that is a useful thing

Guy Bloom (44:19)
Absolutely.

Kate Atkin (44:36)
do for some people. But is it necessary to overcome your imposter feelings? No. One of the things that I think is really useful coming back to this point about the external evidence is

Looking at what other people are telling you. So keep a collection of the positive feedback. Keep a collection of the comments, the emails that people tell you. If it's annual appraisals, if you're employed or if it's client feedback, if you're self-employed, keep a collection of all of this positive feedback. And lots of people do that, but then they only review it to give themselves a confidence boost when they find they're having a little internal wobble and they need to get a little bit of a lift.

not going to help with your imposter feelings because that's used for that specific situation. My suggestion is that you review that evidence much more frequently. So you're reviewing it maybe it's once a week, once a fortnight or maybe once a month max as a regular review and as you review it this is contained in the book as a strategy and

As you review it, you yes and it. Now, over the years, I've done quite a lot of training in a ⁓ fun way with improvisation techniques and the improv school of thought is to yes and an offer. And I really like that. And if you can yes and the offer of the positive feedback in your head, not out loud, but you're yes and in your head, I think it helps to internalize that positive feedback. So it's not yes

and anti-great.

because you don't feel great. it's not that it's yes. And I learned this from that situation or yes. And I can see that's a common thread coming through. it's becoming a strength of mine or yes. And that was a difficult situation. I was pleased with the way it went in the end or yes. And whatever it might happen to be as you are reviewing that external evidence. The part that I think is really interesting that we haven't touched on yet was part of the other aspect of my PhD research was the courage that it

takes. So you talked about some psychological framework earlier Guy and I think what's needed and this is one of my thesis suppositions or propositions was to look at the framework of psychological courage and having courage to update the view of yourself to one that is more positive because we get the feedback and we get and keep and maintain and can remember the negative feedback at the drop of a hat.

Guy Bloom (47:11)
Hmm.

Kate Atkin (47:18)
And there's lots of research done, Roy Baumeister's work springs to mind in the year 2000, of bad is stronger than good. You there's lots of research that indicates we will remember the negative experiences from that level of evolutionary point of view, but we need to make extra effort to remember the positive experiences. And my argument is that actually it takes a lot of internal courage.

to accept how good you really are.

Guy Bloom (47:47)
Do think there's an element for some people where actually the negativity or the problems that that brings to them actually serves them in some way? Because actually by, not everybody, but for some people, is there a actually by saying I have the imposter phenomenon?

I then don't have to approach, I don't have to self-review, I don't have to reflect. I actually can stay in a steady state where I am, poor guy, because he does suffer from the imposter phenomenon or whatever. Yes, exactly. So actually, for some people, they are actively, proactively reading a book, coming to a workshop, wanting to work with you because they... ⁓

Kate Atkin (48:25)
experience.

Guy Bloom (48:37)
they recognize I need the stepping stones, the algorithm, the methodology, the support, whatever it is, to what I would call evidence and replace, which is I need evidence that I can replace the internal narrative. So I'm very familiar with my current internal narrative. I've normalized it and this is how I feel. I now need to evidence new stuff, replace it, become familiar with a new dialogue, then I normalize this new thing and then I can move forward. Right, I've oversimplified that. But for some people,

And I think this is where you've hit something which I think is very relevant, which is for some people, they're already there with the courage looking, you know, they're wanting to be challenged, help me make that change. But I wonder for some, if that is the whole link here is, well, we can do the algorithm, we can give you the methodology, but you're going to have to find the courage to review, to reflect.

to change, come, things will actually probably become a little bit harder. Why? Well, because actually, if you acknowledge that you have a competence and a skill or a comp- you will be making yourself more vulnerable because you will be doing more things. And I wonder if for some people there's a safety. Not for those that are already there on point looking for change and looking on the workshops and reading the books and they're actively trying to work with it, but I wonder if for some people actually this is quite comfortable here.

Is that a thing?

Kate Atkin (50:02)
Yeah,

you've brought up a number of points with that question. And as I said to you earlier, I've listened to the one specifically on psychological safety that you've had and already interviewed ⁓ Dr. Amy Edmondson and Dr. Carolyn Helbig.

They're talking about psychological safety and how safe it feels to speak up in the workplace and enable that environment. That can be really helpful. And if you have that safety, then we'd come back to the external environment is helping to reduce imposter feelings. There is something about, keeping yourself safe and not stretching too much. And sometimes it's this.

For me personally, it was an inner desire to do more, be more. There was something inside me that drove me to push beyond the boundaries. But actually that is an unsafe space and it can cause the anxieties and it can increase the imposter feelings.

So staying safe by one of my participants used the phrase staying in my lane. know, staying in your lane is a safe place to be. it mean you are fulfilling your potential and does it mean that you are growing as an individual? And does it mean that actually an organization is getting the best out of its talent? Absolutely not. Does it mean that strategically you are then choosing not to cause yourself some stresses? Then yes, it does mean that for some.

something also in the psychological terms of self-handicapping behaviour. So we can do behaviours that we know.

will give us an excuse if something doesn't go well, doesn't go right. So, you know, for instance, being interviewed on this podcast, had I stayed up really late the night before and had I had quite a bit too much to drink and had my brain not been quite as sharp, you know, then I could use the excuse of, yeah, well, it was a late night, my brain's a bit fuzzy, da da da da da. And that...

Guy Bloom (51:43)
you

Kate Atkin (52:01)
For some people, know, the imbibing of substances can be self-handicapping behaviours. There's also something that you alluded to, which in my research came up with the coping strategies. Now, some participants coped with their imposter feelings by overworking. Now that to me, the desire for perfection...

gets to a point where it's, using the psychological term, maladaptive. So there's a good level of perfectionism, termed adaptive. So it's positive, it's healthy, you to aim for good.

or just above good, then what's wrong with that? But to keep perfecting, perfecting, perfecting so you're becoming so stressed and anxious about it, that's maladaptive perfectionism. And sometimes we find with our imposter feelings that we are coping strategies are actually not helpful strategies.

Guy Bloom (53:07)
Which is quite interesting actually, because a lot of high achievers have that imposter syndrome, they overcompensate with, as you've discussed, their massive workload, massive striving for excellence. And it of course can have huge successes for them, because they are often, very often, outperforming, or they're part of that group of people with that phenomenon that would be outperforming.

and then it lives with them forever because every time they go up a level or the reason for their success is due to the fact that I work this hard and it's this own and actually in theoretically it's almost like a functioning alcoholic it's it's it actually is strangely working for them but it's not good for them

Kate Atkin (53:41)
Absolutely.

I need to work really hard because that's how I get successful, you or alternatively, we put success down to luck by chance. And we forget that in amongst that of hard work and luck and chance is three big dollops of knowledge, skills and abilities. And I think that's really important, but we put down the success to the hard work or to the luck. And so we think if it comes easy, then, you know, I don't deserve it. And it's a really interesting thing. I've got to keep working hard to keep that.

narrative going. There's something else that you mentioned that I do just want to touch back on when we were talking about the question that you were phrasing a moment ago, because there's some researchers that are now proposing a terminology of what they're using the term of strategic imposters. So I am talking about my imposter feelings, because again, that gives me the outlet or the excuse either internally or

Guy Bloom (54:25)
Hmm.

Kate Atkin (54:50)
to others that, well I didn't do so well because... And so yeah, so there's this level of are people just behaving like imposters or telling people they are an imposter, feeling like an imposter.

Guy Bloom (54:56)
formative.

Kate Atkin (55:07)
And actually, of the things we didn't clarify right at the very beginning of this podcast is the imposter is an internal feeling. It's not being an imposter, not like Frank Abagnale or immortalized in the film Catch Me If You Can. You know, it's not about being an imposter or being a fraud. It's about feeling like it on the inside. And there is that suggestion by some that there are some people who are strategic imposters. Well, my research specifically focused on people who were ⁓

in the frequent or intense categories of imposter phenomenon feelings. So those were the people that I interviewed to understand their coping strategies. And they were not strategic imposters. They didn't fall into that category. I'm not saying that they don't exist, but that's not the category that I'm talking about.

Guy Bloom (55:57)
getting that. Wow. So listen, you know, with all people that know what they're talking about, the conversation could go on forever. And I'm super alert to the fact that I'll just keep you talking till 11 o'clock tonight and you'll go, mate, I've got a life. So listen, I tend to wrap it around an hour just because of people's of listening capabilities. But this is a fantastic topic. And like with all topics.

You know, there's a spectrum of...

opinions and thoughts and this really feeds into something that you've you know, you've clearly got a genuine care for this you've you can see that you've put the physical energy but the mental intellect into researching it and it's clear that stands true. So I would definitely suggest that and all the links will be in the description but the imposter phenomenon available on Amazon. I'm looking at it right now. Definitely I think ⁓

Kate Atkin I think we should all go and buy it and read it ⁓ Kate if people wanted to reach out and find more about you where do they go?

Kate Atkin (57:10)
so they can go to KateAtkin.com.

That's a very simple website address and they can also find me on LinkedIn as Kate Atkin. I'm a newbie to the Instagram world, but I am available there as Kate Atkins speaker as well. And one of the other things, Guy, that I would just say to, if I may, a wrap up point, because when leaders are managing others and lots of people are or leading others, whichever terminology you wish to use, you see that within your teams, you have

Guy Bloom (57:35)
course.

Kate Atkin (57:45)
some amazing people and we tend to encourage people to believe in themselves by telling them how amazing they are. Can I just encourage people to stop doing that and stop telling people how amazing they are? Instead, tell people why they are amazing because that is what's going to make the biggest difference, giving them the evidence, not the accolade.

Guy Bloom (58:13)
That's a really nice thing to end on. So Kate, just hover for a few moments to make sure everything uploads. I've thoroughly enjoyed talking to you. I know a lot of people will have got huge value from this. So Kate, thank you so very much.

Kate Atkin (58:26)
My pleasure.