Imagine this: You don your favorite navy blazer and arrive bright and early for the morning meeting. You’re about to give a suggestion for the team project, but the voice in your head screams, “Phony. Fake. Fraud. IMPOSTER!”
Instead of sharing your ideas, you swallow your words and nod in agreeance to what everyone else suggests. Someone who suffers from imposter syndrome can experience these strong feelings of self-doubt in the workplace, or with family and friends.
Imposter syndrome is a term that was created by two psychologists in 1978. Although the term itself is not classified as mental disorder, it can lead to anxiety and depression. Imposter syndrome describes when someone feels or believes they do not possess the intellect, skill set or creativity to do anything that is worthy of recognition—even if their shelf is lined with trophies, plaques and medallions. Those feelings of unworthiness create an overwhelming feeling that others will find out about their lack of capabilities and expose them for the “frauds” they think they are.
Anyone can be affected by imposter syndrome. It is estimated that 70 percent of Americans experience these negative, invasive thoughts. However, women, especially African American women, are affected the most.
According to a recent National Bureau of Economic Research working paper, when asked to rate their performance, women overall rated their performance lower than men. On average, men scored themselves a 61 out of 100 and women scored themselves a 46 out of 100.
Even when the women were told that the self-evaluation would be used in the decision to hire them and determine…
their salary, they were still less likely to promote themselves. Why is that? Could imposter syndrome be at the core of this?
The following are a list of signs that may be evidence of imposter syndrome:
The ties between imposter syndrome and the Black woman are deeply rooted in the history of Black women in the workplace. During the Rosie the Riveter era, women went to work the jobs that men left behind when they left to fight in World War II. Although those women performed the same jobs, they were never paid more than 50 percent of what the men earned.
In addition to that inequality, Black women were not given the opportunity to even earn the lesser wage for those jobs because they weren’t allowed to work alongside white women or men. Today, some Black women still carry the weight of feeling like they don’t…
belong in the same space as their white counterparts, or feeling as if they don’t “measure up.”
The seed of imposter syndrome may also be planted during childhood. Some parents drill their young Black daughters on the art of perfection because they believe that this is the only path that will lead her to success. In my book, Woman, Take Off Your Cape!, I discuss how wearing the symbolic “cape of perfection” is detrimental to a woman’s physical, mental and spiritual health. The cape of perfection will have you feeling that nothing you do is good enough, and it can deceive those who care about you into thinking that you’re perfectly put together.
Overcoming Imposter Syndrome
To overcome imposter syndrome, one must be honest with his or herself about the person that matters the most in life, YOU! Remember these points on your journey to overcoming imposter syndrome:
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