Leadership Voyage

S4E4: Handling Imposter Syndrome with Sonia Bertek

• Jason Wick • Season 4 • Episode 4

Share episode

Text Jason @ Leadership Voyage

Jason talks with Sonia Bertek about imposter syndrome, what it is, how to deal with it, and how to help others with it.

  • What is Imposter Syndrome?
    • 56% say they experience it weekly
    • 17% don't experience it
      • about 50-50 men/women breakdown
    • But many folks don't know what it is
    • Lack of confidence versus imposter syndrome
  • Why is this Topic Important?
    • So many are affected
    • Not isolated to work
    • Social media - feeling like you don't stack up
    • Diversity of perspective is important
  • Experiencing Imposter Syndrome
    • Manifests through
      • avoiding new opportunities for fear of failure
      • burnout to prove self
      • comparisons to others
    • Claim your space
      • give yourself permission to be visible and occupy where you are
      • Brene Brown talks about this
      • accept who you are without shrinking or hiding
    • Growth requires learning
      • what you now know, there was a time you didn't know it
    • Dealing with imposter syndrome - things you can do TODAY
      • name it
        • it occupies less space
        • "what's the worst that could happen?"
      • identify positive blind spots
      • "Stuart Smalley" visual reminders
  • Leading Others
    • a sign of imposter syndrome from someone else could be if they're not speaking up in meetings
    • as a leader show your vulnerability
    • advice for an employee feeling imposter syndrome
      • prop up and remind them why they're there
      • praise

Sonia Bertek, co-founder of Golden Mean Consulting Group, is a Leadership Strategist, Executive Coach, and Team Architect who has led teams in marketing, support, sales, and customer success. She’s climbed the ladder from contributor to VP, and she knows what it takes to coach managers and individual contributors toward balance, clarity, and sustainable success.

Her specialty? Creating experiential learning systems that help leaders show up as their full selves—at work and beyond.
 
She’s not just about ideas. She’s about impact, using leadership reflection techniques and manager training programs to unlock performance.

Sonia lives in Colorado with her husband, two sons, and cats Alfredo & Pepe.

Favorite hobby: lifting heavy things.

Leadership Voyage
email: StartYourVoyage@gmail.com
youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LeadershipVoyage
linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonallenwick/, https://www.linkedin.com/company/leadership-voyage-podcast/
music: by Napoleon (napbak)
https://www.fiverr.com/napbak
voice: by Ayanna Gallant
www.ayannagallantVO.com
==========

Instacart - Groceries delivered in as little as 1 hour.
Free delivery on your first order over $35.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

wherever you are on your leadership voyage it starts[Music] here all right everybody welcome back to another episode of Leadership Voyage the podcast dedicated to your pursuit of becoming a great leader my name is Jason Wick your host uh if you want to reach me go ahead and email me start yourvoyaggmail.com or you can text me there's a link directly at the top of the episode notes uh that should say textjason leadershipvoyage feel free to give me your thoughts on the show ideas for episodes um anything at all that you're facing um I'd love to hear about it uh today we have a really fun episode but it's the first guest of season 4 uh Sonia Bertech who is someone that I have known for 11 years she and I worked together in uh my last role and she and I actually work together now as we have been starting our business of our own which has been really fun and challenging but uh Sonia is an excellent leader um uh has previously served on executive teams uh led marketing sales support a lot of the customerf facing roles in organizations and what I find fun well what I find interesting about this conversation is how important it is uh we talk about imposttor syndrome in this episode and we kick things off about really defining imposttor syndrome because what we learned through some research for this show was that some people don't know what imposttor syndrome is and that's okay and that's good that's why we're talking about these things but once we level set about the topic then there are a lot of really interesting actionable things that people who face imposttor syndrome can do to try to make their circumstances a little bit easier and more manageable uh some tactics to uh to go ahead and try so I encourage you to sit through this one it's a good conversation with Sonia Bertk uh here on Leadership Voyage all[Music] right everybody welcome back to another uh episode of Leadership Voyage and I'm really excited it's it's the first episode of the fourth season when I have another person other than myself so I'm here with Sonia Bertk who's the co-founder of Golden Mean Consulting Group and Sonia it's good to see you good to see you too thanks for having me i'm very excited absolutely and let's not play dumb for anyone who's listening you and I have known each other for a very long time um so this should be a pretty fun conversation but uh yeah it's fun to be here and and have you officially on the show so it's going to be great absolutely yeah everyone will get a glimpse into our conversations that we have constantly exactly at least where the the microphones we're not aware of are recording but the Yeah not Not that we're intentionally aware of it yeah and you know we're going to jump pretty much into it today because it's a topic that I will say when when we were preparing for this uh imposttor syndrome topic uh I think some information that I personally learned about what others might think about imposttor syndrome has kind of broken this whole thing open for me personally so I am actually genuinely excited to talk about it but we asked LinkedIn people about imposttor syndrome right and we said um how often does feeling like an impostor kind of inhibit your uh willingness to speak up in meetings mhm and when we asked a bunch of people this on LinkedIn over a thousand people replied uh responded to the survey and it was 56% of people who said that at least on a weekly basis are kind of hesitant to speak up in the business setting because of imposttor syndrome and that's a really telling stat um and we're going to get into all of this but what I have to say the thing that's the most interesting about this survey is the people who commented because what I learned is a lot of people don't know what imposttor syndrome is mhm and I found that equally interesting so the way we're going to level set here is for anyone listening if you if you think you know what imposttor syndrome is but you were wrong that's okay imposttor syndrome is an internal experience of intellectual phoniness or undeserved success despite objective measures the phenomenon was first described in 1978 among a group of high achieving and successful professional women imposttor syndrome has been so been associated with anxiety burnout suicidal ideiation a lower sense of professional fulfillment so I don't know if you had anything to say about what you thought people thought imposttor syndrome is how commonly held the understanding is do you have any thoughts on that because it's something that I think kind of surprised both of us is the different interpretations of what the term imposttor syndrome meant yeah yeah i mean I think it's interesting because it it probably does feel or look different to everybody right not everyone is going to experience it in the same way or be impacted by it in the same way um you know one of the things I was really shocked about was the 17% of people in that survey that said they don't feel imposter syndrome i'm like "Hey I want to talk to you cuz I want to know what your secret sauce is." Um but I think I mean that's the reality right not everyone um is impacted the same way and I think for me personally like hindsight being 2020 I think I've really struggled with this my whole life even starting back in high school when I was trying to find my place like what group do I fit in what activities do I do that sort of thing right and looking back I can see certain decisions I made or didn't make because I didn't think I was good enough or smart enough or worthy enough um but then it's like as you think about it how much of that is just a lack of confidence in myself versus what's really imposttor syndrome right and is there a difference i think for me the impact of it really came into focus in my last role as the VP of operations at the music software company where you and I both worked um this was a role that I essentially carved out for myself i saw a need for it in the business i pitched the idea to the exact team and made the case for why I'd be the ideal candidate to fill the role and that was really the easy part the imposttor syndrome oddly kicked in for me after I officially stepped into the role i was the lone female on the exec team of a group of very smart and accomplished men um and I do want to say for the record that nothing they did or said ever made me feel less than i was incredibly lucky to be surrounded by a team that was empathetic and supportive um you know this was all internal internal stuff right um even though I had earned a seat at the table I still felt like I had less to offer than they did for some reason and I had to ask myself why you know cuz you know was it because our backgrounds look different was it because their skills were more tangible ultimately it took reflecting on those questions and reminding myself in those moments that I did belong there and I owed it to myself i owed it to the business i owed it to the employees to not let that imposter syndrome win you know I was at the table because of my passion for creating connections and great places to work and um ultimately it came down to like if I wasn't going to do the work who was right and that that was sort of the the trigger for me thank you for kind of describing a little bit of your own personal um relationship with imposttor syndrome and even recently and I think and I've firsthand of course had the the advantage and the fortune of seeing your work as we are colleagues and have been colleagues for ages but kind of some of the stuff you just touched on there right 17% of the people we asked over a thousand said they don't feel imposttor syndrome and drilling into the people who answered um cuz remember the origins of imposter syndrome in 1978 it was focused on women in this first kind of uh explanation of it when when when we're looking at the survey results there the people who said that they don't feel imposter syndrome almost half of them were women and I thought that was interest i was actually happy to see that but I thought my first hypothesis without having a clue was like "Oh I bet this is all a bunch of dumb men which I can say as a dumb man." But I I think you talking about your journey you're touching on something really interesting in the early years right you're saying I don't know where the difference is between confidence or lack thereof and imposttor syndrome and I think that's something we really should focus in on here everybody has times where they don't feel confident sure there's this piece to imposttor syndrome which is in spite of objective measures of qualification and success yep you as the person experiencing it still don't feel you're worthy of whatever you have right of whatever you're doing and I think that's the part I want people to remember as we we forge ahead in this conversation so you gave us a little background about yourself um both young and uh you know are you fitting in with the right people or whatever that might be and and even into a role of being the only woman on an executive team and should you be there beyond that why is this topic of imposttor syndrome so important to you personally yeah it's a great question I I really truly believe imposttor syndrome is something that everyone has dealt with or will deal with at one point or multiple points in their lives it's not invi it's not something that's isolated to the work environment either right it can impact any part of your life any relationship and you know in this day and age I really do think it's been amplified with the presence of social media and the pressure to feel people feel in terms of like oh I got to keep up with the Joneses right um seeing what other people are doing and then looking at yourself and saying like oh I don't stack up and the reality is the diversity of perspectives is so important in our world and it's critical that everyone feels safe to speak up and share their thoughts and imposter syndrome really dampers this ability um you know as a as a working mother I continue to struggle with this i'm in this constant state of balancing the workload and frequent context shifting it just never truly feels like I'm giving myself fully in any situation even though I know that's not true right i in my head knows that I'm giving everything I can in that moment and and that's enough and I think it's important for people to hear this that you know people do struggle with it and it's okay it's normal i think it's just part of being human yeah i think a lot of listeners will relate to your uh explanation of not giving feeling like you're not giving any everything to anything if I'm saying that right yep um so thanks for for saying that i think that that's yeah a lot of people that will that will land with them so so now that we have their attention um I'd like to divide this kind of into two sections and the first one will be the longer section but talking from the perspective of someone who is experiencing imposttor syndrome someone who's feeling like they're not able to give everything they can in any situation or that they don't deserve to be in a situation even though there are objective measures to suggest of course you deserve to be here mhm and then the second part would be since the podcast is leadership voyage for those who are leading folks with imposttor syndrome uh so let's start off with um speaking kind of to those who are aware that they experience this okay mhm so in your uh in your words and your experiences what are some ways uh some common ways that this manifests itself in the workplace sure yeah I mean I think first and foremost it's avoiding new challenges or opport or opportunities right um the fear of being exposed that oh I don't really know what I'm doing or they're going to they're going to find out that I'm a phony right so people just tend to turn down opportunities for feel of fail for fearing that they're going to fail or that they're going to make mistakes and that somehow is a reflection on them being an impostor um I see this especially for women when they're applying for new roles they'll look at a job description they'll be looking at the required qualifications and you know they'll run into one that maybe they don't 100% check the box on and so then they decide not to apply and in my experience that is not the case for men you know they uh look look at a role and they say "Oh yeah you know I might 75% whatever or I'll jump right in um so I think definitely you know stepping out of your comfort zone for fear of that failure um I think another one too is just overworking and burnout i think people who suffer from imposter syndrome tend to feel like oh if I just work really hard um you know I'll be able to prove myself and and that I deserve the success that I have right and then I think too comparing yourself to others that's kind of you know I mentioned that earlier in terms of like keeping up with the Joneses it's like it's we live in a world where stuff is constantly in our face right uh in terms of you know what this family's doing what that person did at work you just people and it's great that people are sharing their lives um but comparing yourself to others is not um I I don't think it's a it's a healthy practice right um so I think those are three ways that I've seen that manifest itself yeah those are good thank you so kind of shying away from new opportunities you you shared the example of women being less likely to just apply for a position if they're not 100% exactly meeting every qualification that's that's laid out there um burnout in a way that if I work harder maybe I'll I'll I'll deserve to be here in essence right and then um lastly comparing yourself to others and I think that's an interesting one you know it's we have a lot more information about ourselves than we do about others right and so you as you're pointing out we tend to see the highlights of others oh 100% right like no one's on social media showing off their like messy junk drawer or you know the the stuff that's on their dining room table like if I could turn my camera around right now like you'd see a whole bunch of stuff on my People don't see the clutter they see the glamour the the package that people want to show yeah so that doesn't help without a doubt okay so those are three really interesting ways you're saying that imposter syndrome can manifest itself in the workplace and I'm sure that uh many people listening will identify with with some of those without a doubt now for you you know it's not for for us here it's not just about talking about the issue and about the problem it's also talking about like what what to do with that how do we take the energy we have the anxiety maybe we have about that and and what do we do with that and find a productive way so you have this really interesting concept uh which I like called claiming your space and and what does that entail what does that mean yeah yeah for sure so claiming your space really just means giving yourself permission to be visible to contribute and to occupy the spaces you deserve whether that's in relationships at work or in personal endeavors it's about not dimming your light for others and instead being authentic and confident and connected to your worth now that doesn't come without doing the work right it's it's way easier said than done i 100% acknowledge that um Jason you know that I'm a huge fan of Bnee Brown and she talks a lot about claiming your space um her work on vulnerability and connection goes handinhand with claiming your space and facing imposttor syndrome they're all connected you know she discusses how many people struggle with feeling inadequate fearing judgment and this often leads them to like shrink back silence themselves but the true courage according to Brown and I I subscribe to this too is lies in standing in your truth and just accepting who you are without shrinking or hiding you know the imposttor syndrome you know like you might not be uh 100% ready for a role you might not feel like you know you have every box checked that's okay because when you're stepping out of that comfort zone and saying "Hey I'm going to take this space i'm going to try it i'm going to be confident i might make mistakes." That's okay that's human um I think that's one of the keys to you know really kind of cracking the nut when it comes to how do I face that yeah a lot of good stuff there i mean we have these opportunities to grow when we're faced with new challenges or uh going to take on a new role mhm and that means that there will be things that we haven't done before this this survey I keep referencing that that you and I put out someone added a comment to it it was actually just this morning today's April 8th um for anyone listening and somebody just added a comment to it today and it it fits perfectly into this it says "I'm extremely confident in what I do in my current job with the company I've been with for 8 years that confidence does not translate to applying for new jobs i worry I'm going to seem extremely competent when talking about my current role but if I get to a new role or a new place it's all going to go away i'm not going to know how things work my skills won't be up to their standards my confidence will be gone." Mhm that That's got to be pretty common totally yeah i mean I resemble that comment it's It's so true but like you just have to remind yourself in your you know whoever that person was and the role that when you first took it there were things that you didn't know bingo right and that's Yeah that that's that's the key right there that's um I think everyone feels that on some level in order to I'm going to try to paint a visual verbally which may or may not work for others but I if if you think of your all the competencies you have is like a circle right mhm i mean in order to make that circle larger uh you kind of have to break it you kind of have to go through you have to go through discomfort and so that takes me back to this idea like of you know what's the difference between imposttor syndrome and confidence and I suppose maybe the answer is it doesn't really matter it matters yes but but really what matters is how we navigate the situation i suppose um Yeah yeah i mean Jason you and I both have kids right and one of the things that I've been um challenged with as a parent recently of a six-year-old uh who's in it is getting him to understand that there's this concept of this learning space right you go from having a not having a skill to having a skill and the middle part is really frustrating because you're doing something that you've never done before and like you're going to fail and it's going to be hard and just like how you approach it having that mindset of sitting in the uncomfortableness of it the frustration of it and just persevering and going through it and pushing past it is really the the key right to learning yeah and so we're talking about learning so you know you you just talked about this this concept of claiming your space and accepting yourself not shrinking you know not hiding in essence which I mean let's be honest that sounds great right that sounds fantastic so as with all this stuff I mean first it it comes down to recognition right if you have to be aware of what you're feeling in the first place so okay I want to go for this next role and I'm scared to death i want to take this internal promotion but I'm going to bomb what whatever the feeling is that someone who's listening might have cuz I'm sure many many people can identify with this or there's something on the horizon they might be thinking about we're talking about imposttor syndrome lack of confidence self-doubt whatever we want to call it let's just pragmatically discuss how we can deal with it so do you have some tools techniques resources anything that you might recommend to folks who are in that moment in that uncomfortability or coming up upon that and how they can kind of deal with it yeah for sure i think for me it helps just to name it right like you said recognize that it's there acknowledge it acknowledge that it's happening and then just set it aside i know this sounds easier said than done right um but I found that just like everything else in life if you address it head-on it doesn't take it take as much space right just name it and then move on um identify in your positive blind spots um so this is a concept that that I learned in working with an executive coach um which really fascinated me it just sort of illuminated the whole imposttor syndrome is this idea of positive blind spots being situations where you have a valuable skill but you're unaware of it or you don't recognize its true value become because it comes so naturally to you right i was in a position where I had a very people centered role which required me to have a lot of one-on- ones with folks um which I was energized by i love doing it my colleagues looked at me and said "I don't know how you do that one-on- ones are so draining." Right but I didn't think that it was super valuable because I enjoyed doing it it was something that came supernaturally so I think you know thinking about where your positive blind spots are and really leaning into those is really helpful um and I know this sounds really silly but visual reminders i've relied on post-it notes no lie putting on my mirror or the dashboard of my car that says you're amazing or you got this hey you're pulling a Steuart Smallley huh a Steuart Smallley totally yes for the younger listeners who who is Steuart Smallley al Franken play the character on SNL right i'm good enough i'm smart enough and gosh darn it people like me there you go there's a reason why that resonated with so many folks in the day i love that yeah so name it positive blind spots and visual reminders three really interesting tools okay so let's like step through this for a second okay so somebody's got somebody's in their role let's say maybe they just started and they are just not feeling it right they are they are feeling really bad about being here i'm not qualified i'm not going to be good at this and so on so the first thing you're saying is to name how they're feeling right so just just how should they do that tactic tangibly how do how do you do that um I think in that moment it would be um everyone's going to find out I'm a phony and what's the worst thing that can happen huh right think about the worst thing that could happen name it and set it aside yeah okay that Oh that's good oh gosh that's good okay i mean I think so much so many times when imposter syndrome comes up we get in our own way like we spin up this story of how it's all going to play out right and the story that we tell ourselves in our head especially if we're in this moment of being in this imposttor syndrome mode is everything is awful the world is burning everyone's going to find out that I'm a failure i'm going to get fired and I'm going to end up homeless on the street right like your brain just immediately goes to worst possible scenario um and so I don't know i think just by putting that out there and then like saying it out loud and realizing how ridiculous that is for me at least it helps helps me kind of move past it no I love that because like you said when you first described name it you know it'll take up less space yeah what's the worst thing that's happened that's great that's really powerful i think that could help a lot of people so um you also talked about positive blind spots i know that that's a really cool concept because usually the things that are are our strengths they do come easily and we don't value and recognize those things so I think that's really important because very rarely are you going to find someone who has uh if there were 10 attributes of a human being someone who has 100 points out of a 100 points on all 10 attributes right so acknowledging where you have those strengths and others perhaps don't and its unique value that's really great to bring up and then the visual reminder the Steuart Smallley that'll be easy to remember for those who are familiar with the character so um no great thanks Sonia those are good um and and very tangible and things someone could practice right today when they listen to this so I love it um let's switch over to the leader for a second because if you're managing others leading others whatever that looks like and you know anyone can lead others frankly in my opinion but if you're leading others regardless of your role your title um what are the signs that someone on your team might be experiencing imposttor syndrome and how could someone handle that as the leader yeah that's really interesting i think um you know just going to the survey that we put out in terms of like people not speaking up in meetings for example right i think that's a huge huge red flag if you have someone that one on- one might talk really freely and openly but then in meetings you don't hear from them at all right i mean it could just be that you know they're a little bit more introverted and they don't like to share their voice in public um but it's a good thing to check in on right and not in the meeting calling them out and putting them on on full display but after the fact you know just say like"Hey I noticed that you know you were really quiet what's going on?" Right um and I think too I mean this is my philosophy in in leading no matter what is um showing your vulnerability and expressing times where you've felt imposttor syndrome right anytime that you can show that you're human is going to help build that connection and when that connection is there you know there's that tissue that's built and the trust is built and you know I think people just tend to to speak more freely when that happens yeah two good examples showing vulnerability and and maybe noticing inconsistent behavior so if you have an employee who you're noticing they aren't speaking up um kind of in the and really this is coming from right we as a manager as a leader we're saying listen we know that all these individuals have there's this unique perspective they have value of their own to bring to the conversation and if they aren't we're really more concerned not only about the individual but that they aren't bringing the best of every angle to our teams do you have uh any advice that the manager could give to that employee if they are indeed feeling this and more reserved in speaking up in the group setting yeah I mean I think as a manager it's your responsibility to to um prop people up and to remind them of why they're there and what value they bring right so I think in situations like that publicly praising certain things that those team members are doing will help kind of build the confidence and um show them that you as a leader are seeing that what they're doing is valuable and that they have a seat you know they they deserve to be there um I think that can really help right we're all We're all just uh figures floating around looking for affirmation right like so the more you can do that I think that will always help oh that's good no thank you the time always goes really really fast it it amazes me so we we've had a good discussion here about kind of interesting interpretations of imposttor syndrome defining it talking about it where it's affected you in your life and a couple examples why the topic matters to you things like this uh and you've given us some really nice tangible um examples of where it might show up how you can deal with it claiming your space and other things like that so I think there's a ton of valuable information that people can write down and experiment with so thank you for all of that Sonia of course i hope so as we we start to wrap this down I've got uh a question that um I ask everybody uh on this show and it's what is something that you've learned recently oh I love this question um this was something that I did in interviews at uh you know because I learned from you too this is so fun um so I married a huge documentary nerd it was actually in our marriage vows that I'd watched them with him um so our most recent binge has been this series I think it's on Hulu called Foods That Built America and it highlights example after example of how competition in a market drives growth and the I mean which you're like duh right but the one I really loved was this example of Kellogg versus Post you know the serial companies so it all started at the Battle Creek Sanitarium which was a world-renowned basically health resort in Michigan back in like the late 1800s it was managed by this guy Dr john Harvey Kellogg and it grew from like kind of being a small institute to this really holistic wellness destination um that actually attracted really prominent figures like Thomas Edison and Henry Ford Amelia Heheart well anyways Dr kellogg had a brother WK Kellogg who worked there too and he had this idea to actually like commercially promote the cereal that they were serving at the center um originally his brother said "No that's like totally going to degrade the brand people are aren't going to come to the sanitarium blah blah blah." Turns out that there was a guy working there also called CW Post and he overheard this idea and he thought "Huh that's brilliant." So he left started his own version um created the post company in 1895 it debuted the first cereal Grape Nuts in 1897 oh my goodness um and then you know after the fact Kellogg was then officially formed and with its key product at the time Toasted Cornflakes it's just it's interesting because like to me if you know the brother said no if Post hadn't gone out and shown that it was possible maybe Kellogg wouldn't have pursued it and kind of not listened to his brother um and now Kellogg has like the higher stake of market in the serial market you know they kind of go back and forth but Kellogg's always kind of on top so I don't know i just thought it was an interesting story it was like you know some corporate corporate espionage and you know all about cereal all about cereal i love that that it was a great series there's We've learned so much it's I recommend people checking it out it's really cool interesting what was the name again foods that built America foods that built America yeah who knows if we if there hadn't been the cereal uh the cereal wars of the late 1800s maybe we'd be eating those little packets that the Jetsons were were eating for breakfast or something i don't know um well that's a cool story thanks and and the the the the documentary uh piece in your wedding vows that's a new one I've never heard so that's pretty cool like that it was uh pretty pretty important uh for him to know that I was going to be by his side watching there you go there you go well Sonia Bertk it has been my pleasure to have the conversation it's good to hang out with you in a different context today and uh yeah thanks again really nice to talk to you thank you for having me it's been fun[Music] all right though so there you have it uh Sonia Bert on Leadership Voyage talking about imposttor syndrome uh as a quick reminder you can reach out let me know what you thought startyougmail.com text me with the link in the show notes uh however you want to get in touch uh yeah it's an important topic uh don't you think it's it's something that you know evidently at least a handful of people don't understand what it is and that's fine um I certainly had some assumptions broken going into some of the research for this topic and for this discussion but um either way glad you hung with us and here's a quick recap of of what we faced uh we defined imposttor syndrome for everybody out there sonia talked a little bit about her own journey uh with uh imposttor syndrome and uh lack of confidence gave us a little overview of why it's an important topic to uh to discuss in today's world uh then we had two sections who uh for those who are experiencing imposter syndrome and then also for those who are leading others with imposter syndrome for those who are experiencing it some of the common ways that it shows up in the workplace is saying no to new opportunities burning out and comparing yourselves to others this topic of claiming your space which basically means accepting who you are uh and um not shrinking into yourself or hiding what to do when experiencing imposttor syndrome name it be aware and embrace your positive blind spots and put visual reminders in place as far as what leaders can do to help others when they're experiencing imposttor syndrome uh create opportunities to uh give them a chance to speak up in meetings positive affirmation about their contributions uh things like this basically imposttor syndrome is rampant 56% of people in our survey admitted to not speaking up on a weekly basis so get out there folks be aware of it[Music]