Cade Cowan (2:57)

So imposter syndrome is really. It relates to our ability to internalize our achievements. So, you know, with imposter syndrome, we can have a resume that validates our reason for being in the room that we're in, and we perform and we perform well, but in the end, we don't actually internalize the achievement. We explain it away. We'll assign external factors to it as opposed to our own internal capability. So really, it's this idea of I had a success, but rather than congratulating myself for the success and recognizing all of the hard work and the experiences that I've collected over the years that have led to the success, I. I explain it away, you know, and there's this sneaking feeling, thus the name imposter, that somebody's going to find me out, somebody's going to discover I'm a fraud and I shouldn't be in the room, and I'm lesser than. So that's really kind of where that would be the definition, or at least the one that I ascribe to it. The idea has been around for a while. The original researchers, Clance and Imes, kind of coined the phrase in the late 70s, like 1978. And what's interesting about that period, Christopher, is that's when a lot of women were beginning to achieve success in the workplace. And regardless of the fact that these women had high test scores, they had advanced degrees, they had a record of success, they felt as if they didn't belong there. And so Clance and Imes got interested in this idea, and they originally coined it the imposter phenomenon, which. Which is what we've now come to call the imposter syndrome. So that's kind of the origin, which I think is apropos. It's interesting. I think it's apropos to mention those origins because as we go on, one of the things that we know is sometimes women, as well as those in the ethnic minority, perhaps feel it a bit more because of that lingering feeling of perhaps I don't belong here, or I don't see a lot of people around me who. Who look like me. We can go into that a bit, but I think the origins of it are appropriate to mentioned just given that it's still applicable today.

Christopher Camp (5:18)

And I think one of the keys that you mentioned is oftentimes it's the ability to sort of explain away our Achievements in the face of evidence that suggests that they are real or legitimate too. And I remember for me personally, when I matched into orthopedic residency, I got the letter, it says, here's where you're going, this is what you're doing. You know, it's all official. It's right there. And then even after I got that, still didn't totally believe it and showed up and said, I'm not sure that I'm really supposed to be here or that I belong, despite the fact that I had the official, you know, letterhead and documentation and went through the whole process and everything. And everybody else is, of course you are. You went through the process. And so it's often in contradiction to that clear evidence that says otherwise. And I wonder how that relates to the concept of just having low self confidence or humility, because I think all of these concepts are a little bit interrelated, but different.

Cade Cowan (6:16)

They are. And it's a good thing to parse those two things out. So I would think of low self confidence as more of. I'd call it global versus specific. So in other words, if I have low self confidence, that's kind of a. That's a global way of thinking. My global way of thinking. So low self confidence means I'm not up to the task. I don't actually think I'll be successful. And so low self confidence means that I might steer away from the opportunity because I don't think I'm actually going to be able to do it. Imposter syndrome is I actually did it, you know, and the fact is, a lot of those that suffer from imposter syndrome actually are high performers, they're high achievers. And so they're looking for the opportunity, right? And then they go through it, they succeed, but then they don't actually give themselves credit for the success. So I call that kind of specific. So global is low self esteem in general. I don't think I'm up for the task. Imposter syndrome. I actually achieved it. I did it, I delivered. But now I'm going to explain it away. I got lucky or, you know, and my, you know, or I charmed them, for instance, you know, I'll do a lot of work in front of executive audiences and you know, I've said, and people have said, oh, great job. And I'll say, oh, well, it was just a good audience, you know, that's explaining it away. That's robbing myself of saying, actually, no, you brought 20 years of experience into the room. You know, you know, Your stuff, you've studied this. You don't, you don't refer to any of that. You say, I just had a good audience. They were a warm, friendly audience. So that's low self esteem. Low self esteem. I might shy away from the opportunity because I don't think I'm going to do it. Imposter syndrome. I did it, but now I'm not going to give myself credit for it.

Christopher Camp (8:04)

Ah, very interesting. And so I would imagine there's a little bit of. Oh, there can be some overlap. You can't have both, but you probably can have just one or the other, and they're not exactly the same thing.

Cade Cowan (8:14)

Yeah. And then you mentioned humility. Humility is more. Humility is more grounded in an emotional way of being. I mean, working in leadership development, we like to see humility. Right. We want the person that says, look, I don't know the answer, but I can find it out. I'm not an expert in this yet, but there's an opportunity for me to learn. So humility. I kind of pull away from the idea of imposter syndrome. I think those are two somewhat different constructs.

Christopher Camp (8:49)

Yeah, I agree. I think the term humility often gets confused in our society today, and a lot of people think that humility is sort of about putting yourself down and belittling yourself, which. Which I think is not necessarily the case. I love. There's a great C.S. lewis quote. You know, humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less. So it's just you're not putting yourself down. You're just not making yourself the center of everything, which. Which I think is maybe tangential, but very, very much different than, than low self confidence and imposter syndrome as you described. So I think definitely three different entities we're talking about here.

Cade Cowan (9:26)

Exactly right. And with humility, you know, I think it was Adam Grant that coined the term, or at least used the two words together in a way that was popularized. He talked about confident humility. You know, it's the ability to, on one hand be humble, but on the other hand be confident that as challenges arise or new topics arise, that you have the ability to comprehend, that you have the ability to learn. So that's more, again, I think, a separate construct, one worth a different episode perhaps.

Christopher Camp (9:57)

Yeah, well, let's jump. You mentioned the concept of confidence, and I'm wondering, is there an opposite problem to imposter syndrome? Can somebody not have enough of it or can they be overconfident?

Cade Cowan (10:09)

I think I actually talk about this a lot with executives. I mentioned this a lot. Perhaps you've heard of the Dunning Kruger effect.

Christopher Camp (10:18)

Oh, yes.

Cade Cowan (10:18)

So Dunning Kruger, it's practically the opposite of imposter syndrome. So think of it this way. Imposter syndrome would be high competence, low confidence. Right. So I've got the ability to do it, but I did it and now I'm not really confident that that was me. I just got lucky. The Dunning Kruger effect is where I have low competence but high confidence. In other words, I'm shooting too high. And there are some really, these stories get funny. One of the authors that I love, Arthur Brooks, writes for the Atlantic. He cites a New Zealand study where 80% of drivers said they were above average in their ability to drive. Let's think about the math there. And then the other one that's perhaps my favorite is the Washington Post in 2023. They cited a YouGov survey that said 32% of Americans were confident, actually very confident in their ability to land a commercial airline airplane if the pilot became incapacitated. 32%. Now let's just think about that, Christopher, like when you start. And then they interviewed a pilot that said, tell us about how foolhardy that actually is. And they said, well, start by the fact that we now lock our doors. Right. Post nine, 11, we lock the doors. So you got to get into the cockpit first. Right. You've then got to somehow wrestle probably a 200 pound man typically out of the seat, out of a very cramped quarters before you even get into the pilot seat. So like think about how ridiculous that statement actually is.32%. And by the way, that was about 50% of men, 20% of women. So there's an interesting little check that, that's this Dunning Kruger effect, you know, where we actually way overstate our competence. That's the opposite. In some ways I think that's more dangerous. Now you don't see it as often, particularly in the boardrooms, the executive tables that I get the opportunity to sit at. Certainly you can at times.

Christopher Camp (12:28)

So in a lot of ways, really what we're striving for here is to try to get our confidence to align with our competence.

Cade Cowan (12:37)

Exactly.

Christopher Camp (12:37)

And in reality we want both to increase, but they need to increase appropriately and in relation to one another.

Cade Cowan (12:45)

That's a really good way to put it.

Christopher Camp (12:46)

Okay, so we know some of the downsides of imposter syndrome. One, it just, it feels terrible. We've all sort of experienced it. You don't feel like you belong. You know, you're putting yourself down. So it just, it feels bad. But what are some other potential downsides to experiencing imposter syndrome?

Cade Cowan (13:04)

Yeah, so part of it relates to how a person experiences it. So this cycle that we tend to go through that sets up the imposter syndrome is so there's a trigger event, right? So you've been invited to speak somewhere or you've been invited to present to the CEO or some high stakes event. And because again, typically those with imposter syndrome are high achievers, they accept it, right? You know, they say yes immediately, they get anxiety about the situation. And so typically there is one of two responses to that anxiety. One is overwork. So I am going to over prepare and the other is I'm going to procrastinate. I dread it, I fear it, and I'm going to put it off. And by the way, that's my response. And everybody that works with me will tell you that's my response to their great consternation. But for those that are the over preparers, you can imagine it's, you know, it's like burnout. Long, long hours. There is, you know, obviously the stress that goes along with that. There's all the stories that you tell yourself about what's going to happen. So you know, mental anxiety, depression, there's even been some examples, you know, particularly in high stakes environments like medicine where people talk about suicidal ideation. So it can go really far. Now most people aren't going to go that far, but they are going to do, they are going to experience the burnout and the, the overwork. You know, this, this idea of just think about it, if you're saying, look, they're going to find me out, I got to be the smartest person in that room. And you know, that room's going to be full of really smart people. You're going to work really hard, but you're going to overwork. And if you take on every challenge with that amount of vigor, you can imagine burnout is, is waiting for you.

Christopher Camp (15:00)

And I think too sometimes, oftentimes people will sense that a little bit as well, which, which then it may end up, you may become a self fulfilling prophecy here. If you, if you don't have the confidence in yourself and then you portray that to others, it could, it could end up resulting in them losing that as well. So I think it's important for us to try to, to jump in and intercept this process and stop it if we can. In order to do that, we have to understand a little bit more about how it develops. So Is there certain patterns that this tends to follow and how this comes about within us?

Cade Cowan (15:35)

Yeah, it's a good question. I mean, some would say that it starts really early in childhood. Right. You know, we've all got this voice of the critic. First time I ever heard that was from a gentleman named Jim Lair. Jim was a famous sports psychologist who later founded the Human Performance Institute. And I had the good opportunity to bring him into several clients that I worked with. And, you know, he talked about the voice of the critic. What's that voice that's running in our head? Usually it's a pretty unkind voice. You know, it's saying meaner things to you than you would say to anybody else. You know. Now, Jim will go on to say that, you know, oftentimes that voice is a parent's voice that we've internalized. So sometimes those can be critical voices, as we know, and we carry that with us. And so that's where some would say that it starts. But then you've also got to look not only at the individual factors, but there can also be environmental factors that I think probably take that voice and make it louder for us, you know, so certainly some cultures, some work cultures, where there's not a high degree of collaboration or a high degree of trust, you can imagine how that would exacerbate the issue. Certainly for people of color or people who are disadvantaged in any way, number of ways, you know, if they're at a table where they are the only person there and where the rest of that table doesn't necessarily value diversity or dissenting voices, the idea of being an imposter syndrome may not just be a voice in your head. There may be subtle messages being sent that you are somewhat of an intruder. So I think we got to think about to what extent is this something that I carry with myself, which in many instances it's true. But also what about the organization I'm in? And then maybe what about the organization I'm leading? You know, I work in leadership. What. What is our organizational culture doing to make people feel welcome and not in fact, an intruder or an imposter? So I think you got to look at both. And then of course, I mean, there are people who are expert in the harms of social media who could speak much more competently than I can on this. But, you know, look at what we look at all day long when we're scrolling. You know, somebody said we compare our behind the scenes reality to somebody else's highlight reel, Right. And so that's an unfair Comparison. But, man, we're swimming in that pool all the time. And so that certainly thinks, I think, contributes to the problem as well.

Christopher Camp (18:27)

Oh, those are great. Honestly, I think for all of us, it's really probably all of those things are contributing in different ways, in different degrees and amounts. And I know one of the things, oftentimes when you're experiencing imposter syndrome, it can lead you to want to retreat a little bit, to say, all right, I don't belong. Let me back out. I'm not going to take that risk. I'm not going to take this chance. I'm not going to do this thing. But at the same time, you know, one of the things we talk about a lot in society today, in the performance faith, is having a growth mindset and sort of trying to push yourself into those situations where you might feel a little uncomfortable or you're sort of at the edge of your abilities and the edge of what you're capable of doing. How do you balance that? Because if you're somebody who struggles with imposter syndrome, if you're trying to have a growth mindset and you're pushing yourself into difficult situations, are you setting yourself up for failure and maybe working against yourself? How do you balance those two competing interests?

Cade Cowan (19:29)

So there's an old term, it feels somewhat archaic in some ways. It's not very widely shared. It's called the. I learned this in. In a program on adult learning, which was essentially the zone of proximal development. And the zone of proximal development is essentially, where is that space that challenges us enough to keep us interested, to keep us digging, but is not so far from where we currently are that it doesn't produce a feeling of overwhelm. So we got to balance that. You know, it's kind of like that idea of confident humility. You know, where are. How are you balancing between what you don't know and need to learn and what is too much too soon? So, you know, I think about. I hate to use the expression stay in your lane, because a lot of times when you think stay in your lane, that sound that's kind of pejorative, that's putting somebody in their place. But I think of that, particularly when I think of imposter syndrome. It helps me. It's like, where am I expert? Can I define where I'm expert? And am I really aware of when I move beyond that? Because if I'm moving beyond my zone of expertise, I just want to declare that, you know, we talk about confident humility, the ability to say I don't know is tantamount to confident humility. I love Frances Fry. She's a Harvard professor and I've had the good opportunity to listen to her a number of times. And a client where we've brought her in, she's got a huge TED Talk. I think her TED talk is one of the most listened to ever. And she talks about trust and she talks about the trust triangle. And there are three points to this trust triangle and these are ways that we engender trust in others. And she talks about one point of that triangle being, you know, the logic. And she talks about this logic wobble. And she said, you know, when people have logic wobbles, it's because they tend to move beyond their domain of expertise, if you will, and yet they don't declare it. She said, you know, you can be really smart and you can make five really spot on observations or statements, but when you go beyond what you know and you make that one wobbly statement, that's what people are going to remember. So for me, that's one thing that I'm thinking about. You know, if I'm presenting to a group of executives, you know, what am I expert on there? I can make some declarative statements there, I can be confident. But when we move into areas that I clearly know nothing about, you know, and when I'm sitting with, you know, a senior team and somebody from supply chain is speaking, there's a lot that they talk about that I have no idea what they even mean. So in that moment, I'm never going to make a statement, but I'll ask a question, you know, I'll demonstrate curiosity. And so I think being able to understand where I, where I am expert and declaring where I'm not when I'm not is one way to project that confident humility, if you will. I'll tell you a story. When I was 28 years old, and I hate to say that that was in the last century, that date has a 19 in front of it.

Christopher Camp (22:54)

Been a minute.

Cade Cowan (22:55)

Yeah, I was 28 and it was the first time I was presenting. I was working at GE Crotonville. And back at the time, GE Crotonville was this worldwide renowned center of leadership development. And so we would have customers who would come to Crotonville to learn about how GE did certain things. And I had to present to the CEO of Motorola as a 28 year old. And you can imagine everything I was telling myself, you know, what's a kid from Tennessee, 28 years old, doing presenting to the CEO of Motorola and his team, they are going to eat me alive. And before I went out there, in what I would describe a moment of grace, you know, I just heard the message, look, they know so much more than you know about so many things, but they don't know more than you know about this one little topic. And that's what you're going to go talk to them about and that's where you're going to stay. And you know, that kind of has guided me since, you know, where can I make assertions because it's in my zone of expertise and anytime I get out of that, I declare it or I just start asking good questions and that's one way I navigate it.

Christopher Camp (24:06)

Yeah, I think that's tremendous. And I've actually found, similar to that, I find it helpful sometimes to state that up front too. So if you're talking to that group, say, okay, here's what I know, here's what I don't know. And I find myself very commonly saying, well, you know a lot more about this than I do. Tell me what you think. And I feel very comfortable saying that or admitting it. And oftentimes I say, you know, this is what I'm going to focus on. I still don't have all the answers. I'm still growing, you know, this whole human optimization concept like this is a journey, it's not a destination. I'll never have all of the answers. But I'm, I'm pretty dedicated to learning as much as I can and I'm going to take everybody along with me. So come on, let's go.

Cade Cowan (24:46)

That's a wonderful way to do it. You know, I'll sometimes say, look, I don't have data on this, but I can tell you what my observational data is. And you know, we can, we can talk about it, but you know, so I do, you know, just hedge a bit. But we know, you know, we know that a sign of confidence is the ability to state what you don't know. And I think others recognize that, whether they're grounded in the science of emotional intelligence or not. I think they recognize it that when you're declaring what you don't know, here's a stand up person. They're not trying to pull wool over my eyes in any way.

Christopher Camp (25:20)

Well, and in reality, so much of imposter syndrome is that we're afraid that we're going to be found out and we all sort of understand what that means. So then you got to ask yourself, okay, what is it you're afraid that they're going to find out about you. And if that's what you're worried about, just tell them, tell them what that thing is. And now there's no discovery, there's nothing, you know, all your cards are out on the table, which I think could be helpful.

Cade Cowan (25:44)

You start making claims about things that you don't know a lot about. Guess what? You're an imposter. Right. You are an imposter in that moment. So the way to avoid it is to simply state what you don't know.

Christopher Camp (25:54)

Yeah. Yeah. Very good. Okay, so let's talk a little bit about how common this is and kind of where it's coming from. I know we all experience this in different degrees and I've seen, you know, some research that has shown that depending on the group, it's, you know, can be up to 80% of people are experiencing at a given time. But I'm wondering where is it coming from? Like, whose fault is it? Is this a personal failing? Is it an organizational failing, or is this a societal failing that imposter syndrome is so common?

Cade Cowan (26:22)

Yeah, I think it relates to some of what we were saying earlier, you know, this idea of yes, for, you know, there is the, the individual brings something to bear, certainly, you know, whether that's just, again, that voice of the critic or, you know, this underlying ongoing self doubt. But as we said, you know, organizations can contribute to that as well. You know, one of the things, you know, I had the good opportunity, Christopher, to consult to Microsoft for eight years. One of the highlights of my career thus far. I love those folks. Incredibly smart people. And while I was, during those eight years, part of that was before Satya Nadella and then part of that was after he came on board as CEO. And what I loved about Satya's leadership was he introduced this idea, you know, early in the day. And by the way, he was a huge fan of Carol Dweck and the growth mindset. He said that growth mindset was instrumental in the way that he reshaped Microsoft's culture, you know, this idea. He talked about moving from a know it all culture to a learn it all culture early before he kind of declared that he, in some of his early meetings, he would talk about the difference between the performing zone and the learning zone. And so in the performing zone, he expected you to know your stuff. Right? We're talking asking questions about your business and your results. It's important that you know it. But man, when we're talking about at that time emerging technologies like quantum computing or AI, there's so much we don't know. Let's move into this learning zone where all we're really doing is asking good questions. It's okay not to know. And so I think organizations that can't admit what they don't know. We've been talking a lot about us as individuals admitting what we don't know. When a collective group of people come together and they can't talk about what they don't know, you know, that's a really unsafe place for people to be. And that's going to. For those that are feeling like imposters, that's going to exacerbate that feeling. And so, again, my area of expertise, what I practice, is all around leadership development. And so if I'm working with a senior leader, I'm working with a CEO, you know, we'll talk about how do you, you know, how do you instill a culture around you or even a feeling around the, the top table that it's okay not to know, that we can have exploratory conversations, that we can run experiments where what we know is not important, but how quickly we can learn is important. So I think absent those types of leadership mindsets, then absent those cultures can exacerbate that feeling of imposter syndrome. And then of course, back to the societal failings. I think, again, as we were saying, that's a lot of what's true about social media these days. So much gets filtered and everybody looks expert. I mean, I can scroll through instagram and in 15 minutes, you know, everybody is fitter than I am. Everybody's house is much better decorated for the holidays. Their dogs are much more well trained, you know, and we go on and on and on. So suddenly I can feel like, regardless of the achievements that I might have think it might think that I've racked up, I'm still feeling pretty lousy. So I think there's a societal failing in there as well, certainly.

Christopher Camp (29:52)

Yeah. And I think we all feel this, and our relationship with imposter syndrome probably ebbs and flows a little bit over time. Do you feel like there are certain times when we are more prone to experience? Is it certain life transition, certain ages, certain careers, whatever? You know, what are some of the common denominators that maybe set us up or put us at risk for imposter syndrome that we should look out for?

Cade Cowan (30:19)

So, yeah, there are, you know, a lot of times people who are going through transitions. So, for instance, when people have, when they've been promoted, they're in a Brand new role. Korn Ferry did a survey just in 2024, and 71% of CEOs admitted that they felt it. Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks, you know, he said, look, not many CEOs are going to tell you this, but many of us feel like we don't know what we're doing. We shouldn't be here in not so many words. There was one gentleman that I coached who I had first met him when he was running a large region for a retailer. He had hundreds of stores that he was responsible for. Then I saw him go on to lead this organization's online experience. And then I saw him become CEO of another company. And so he asked me to be his transition coach. And I remember him saying, man, he said he went into this new organization as coo, and then he was later promoted to CEO. And he said, cade, he said, I'm telling you, on day one, when I became CEO, people started asking me really hard questions. He's like, I didn't know, I didn't know. So, yes, transitions, certainly, I think people that are in very, what can I, how would I say it? Smart organizations, right? Medicine, law, executive levels. You know, when you are in a performance rich environment, that would certainly be an environment that could foster it. And then, you know, I'd say it again. You know, in areas, you know, in situations where perhaps you are the only person that looks like you, that's going to be an example as well. I mean, my gosh, the U.S. supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, she talks about having imposter syndrome. Maya Angelou talked about it. Michelle Obama said, the feeling never goes away. These are three women, all from ethnic minorities. They have a common experience there. They have ventured into territory where few people who look like them are around them. So that's a situation where it's going to prompt itself as well.

Christopher Camp (32:32)

And I think those are great. And I, as you're going through those, you know, it, it all clicks and it makes perfect sense. And I was thinking another area for me, I think is often after a recent failure, sometimes you have a big failure, especially if it's a big one or, you know, important one, you start to question things more, you know, a little bit more and maybe have a little bit more doubt. That creeps in. So I think that that's another area.

Cade Cowan (32:55)

Can I just tell you a little story about that? You know, I said I worked at GE and there's this old story about Jack Welch, the, you know, the famous GE CEO and one of his senior executives had made a Big mistake. It was like. I think it was like $10 million, which, back in the day when this happened, that was a huge mistake. And Jack called him into the office, and the executive essentially said, well, I guess you're going to fire me now. And Jack Welch said, what do you talk about firing you? I just spent $10 million on your education. So I love that. I don't know that it's that related to the imposter syndrome, but it does show how a leader is responsible for helping those people who have failures frame it into context. I spent $10 million on your education. Education. What are you learning from this? Again, it's not always about points on the board. It's about the rate of my learning.

Christopher Camp (33:47)

I think that's fantastic. You're right. And it does give us a chance to reframe those failures and say, okay, I've learned one way or maybe a hundred ways of how not to do this. So actually, that should increase both my competence and my confidence going forward. But we often let it have the opposite effect. What are some of the signs we can look out for to know if we're starting to experience imposter syndrome? I think sometimes it's obvious, but sometimes it probably creeps in a little bit subtly. We maybe don't recognize it. So what should we look out for to know if it's creeping in?

Cade Cowan (34:19)

Well, I'll tell you when I know it's creeping in for me. And when it's creeping in for me, it's when the voice in my head says, man, I just got to get through this. I just got to survive it. You know? And so I'm in front of senior executives all the time, given the work that I do. And so for me, that. That is the voice that's in my head. And it typically will occur if I'm. If I'm inside of an industry that I don't understand that well. So, for instance, financial services, you know, those bankers, God love them, they speak a language that the rest of us don't necessarily speak. If I'm in a room full of really smart, advanced engineers, it's a language that I don't necessarily speak. So for me, when I'm hearing myself say, I just want to survive this, I know that the imposter syndrome is rearing its head. And what I. The reason that I listen for that, Christopher, is I know that if my mentality is, I just want to survive this, then I'm going to show up in a way that is. And I'm in a protective Stance, right? And we know all the brain science. If I'm in a protective science, in a protective stance, it's the amygdala that's firing, it's not the prefrontal cortex. So I am not going to show up in a way that's curious. I'm not going to show up in a way that's playful. I may not work on innovating my content at all. I'm just going to, I'm going to live in this small box where I know I've succeeded before because I just want to get through it. So that's, that's mine, you know, and that comes, my awareness of that, again, comes from listening to that voice of the criticism. What am I telling myself? That's actually not helpful, unkind, detrimental to my success. So for me, that's how I know it's creeping in.

Christopher Camp (36:19)

I think that's great and I think a lot of things to watch out for that show up in subtle ways. As I was preparing for this and I realized, wow, a lot of this is real. But I think oftentimes, even subtle things like deflecting praise after it happens, somebody thanks you or says good job and you deflect that, or you know, oftentimes that's either you think you didn't earn it or you didn't deserve it, or you don't want it because you don't think you're worthy of it. And so I think that either, you know, attributing your success to others or not being willing to accept thanks, gratitude and praise for the work that you have done is a pretty good sign as well.

Cade Cowan (36:56)

And let's talk about deflecting praise. People do it all the time. I've done it earlier in my career, I've gotten better about now simply saying thank you. But when you deflect praise, not only are you kind of underlining your imposter syndrome, you're giving it, you know, more emphasis than certainly it deserves, but you're also discounting where that person is coming from. You're basically saying you're not worthy to say, right, you're not, oh, thank you. But silly you, it was luck, you know. You know, yeah, so that's kind of a double edged sword. And so deflecting praise is one that I really do think people need to move on both sides for themselves and for the giver of that praise, the person who can find the time and the energy to come and compliment you, you're going to shove it back and say, no thanks, no thank you. Is. Is the word here.

Christopher Camp (37:46)

Yeah, I think that's. That's excellent. Fantastic. We're all guilty of that from time to time.

Cade Cowan (37:51)

Christopher. I've got one story that blew my mind when I first heard it. There is an English author. What is his name? It's like Neil. Oh, gosh. He wrote. He wrote the Sandman and the American Gods. I think I've got that right. Neil Heyman, I believe. And he was at a conference and it was full of, like, authors and writers and scientists. And he was feeling that he didn't deserve to be there. And he was struck up a conversation with who he described as an elderly gentleman. And this elderly gentleman said, man, he said, I don't need to be here. I don't deserve to be here. He said, you know, all I did was go where they told me to go. And Neil looked at this gentleman and he said, but you were the first man on the moon. He was talking to Neil Armstrong. Neil freaking Armstrong. He was saying, I don't deserve to be here. And I sometimes think of that story because, you know, it reminds me of how silly we can be, you know, when we are in that space, when we're deflecting the praise, when we're externalizing our achievements. You know, Neil Armstrong did it. It sounds so silly coming from him. Probably silly coming from us, too.

Kathy Werzer (39:13)

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Christopher Camp (39:42)

Yeah, I think, I think you really, honestly, all of us, it really is silly. So let's talk. Let's jump at our third section here. We'll talk about some solutions for how we help people fix this problem. So first, how do we know if it's something we need to improve? Is it. Is it too simplistic just to say everybody needs to fix this, or there's some certain, certain things we need to be looking out for to know. Yeah, this is a big deal for me. I really got to focus on this.

Cade Cowan (40:09)

Yeah, I. Look, I. I think that there are certain. I think, you know, we know that something like 70% of people can experience this. I mean, you said it earlier, the stats show a very wide range, but most people agree that something like 70% of people are going to experience it. Women perhaps a little bit more than men. But it shows up differently in how they deal with it. So let's just accept that it's somewhat universal. So I don't necessarily think that we need to fix it, but we need to think about how do we allow the doubt that we feel to inspire us or motivate us to. To continue learning. So you certainly got to fix it as it comes in so much as it means I'm going to avoid opportunities or I'm going to work myself to death. That part we need to think about fixing. But I think a little doubt can be helpful if we adopt this growth mindset of I may not be expert here yet. Carol Dweck, she kind of popularized that idea. She was the first one to talk about how powerful that word yet is. I don't know if you saw the podcast with Meghan Markle and Jamie Lima where they started talking about it and it got widely panned because they were just kind of. It felt silly the way that they were saying it and overdone. But there's some real. There's some real psychological weight to that idea of yet. Hey, I may not know it yet, but I've got the confidence that I'm going to learn it. So that's kind of how I think about this thing is, you know, I've got these coping mechanisms. First of all, I'm going to, as I said earlier, like, how do I stay in my expertise when I move outside of it, declare that I'm outside of it, and start asking really good questions, demonstrate curiosity, and then how do I, you know, remind myself that I do have the wherewithal and the tenacity to continue learning the things that I don't yet. That I don't yet know? So that's kind of how I think about it, Christopher. Not so much as fixing it, but embracing it and think about how I use it to spur additional learning.

Christopher Camp (42:19)

Yeah, perfect. That's. That's very well said. I don't think this is an on, off switch that you can just, you know, get rid of it and eliminate it from your life. You know, it's sort of a. It's a growth process for sure.

Cade Cowan (42:31)

You know, one thing I would say that helps is to name it when you're experiencing it. Can you label it as such? One of the coaches that we work with at edc, Marissa Patterson, she's the first person that I ever heard use the expression name it to tame it, you know, and once you can Name it. You're kind of dissociating from it. You know, it's kind of a. There's an emotional. Emotional management technique which is, rather than saying, I am angry, I feel anger. Because what we're doing is we're dissociating ourselves from the emotion, and it helps us actually look back at the anger and say, okay, what's causing the anger? That same move can be made with imposter syndrome. I'm experiencing imposter syndrome. Not I am an imposter. I'm experiencing imposter syndrome. It allows us to get curious about it. So what is driving it right now for me?

Christopher Camp (43:27)

Yeah. And that allows us to look at it more as sort of a scientist that we've talked about, you know, say, okay, this is an observation I've made. Now what am I going to do? So why don't we. Let's. Let's split these up. You've named several good things, and I've been writing them down, but I'd like to maybe split them up in things we should fix in our mindset about this and then maybe some actual behaviors that we could do. So maybe we could put together a couple lists here of things. So let's maybe first run through quickly what. What are some of the mindset changes that we need to do. And the one you just said there was fantastic, I think, and basically don't judge yourself for it. Take the negative emotion out of it, which is one of the mindset things I think is helpful. So sort of be compassionate to yourself for it. What are some other mindset things we should be thinking about?

Cade Cowan (44:16)

So I think that the. Being compassionate. Yes. I think the other mindset shift is, you know, to what extent can you adopt that growth mindset? You know, this idea of. I'm not expert yet. I don't know the answer yet. I think those are probably two of the biggest shifts that one can make.

Christopher Camp (44:35)

I think it's. I think that's really helpful. I think another one, too is there's often when you're experiencing imposter syndrome, you think you're the only one that has it. But you just mentioned, you know, some of the most successful CEOs and astronauts and other people in our world have experienced it. So you. You have to recognize that you're not the only one and that this is fairly universal.

Cade Cowan (44:54)

You know, if you don't recognize that you're the only one, just listen to that song by Radiohead, Creep. Remember that song, Christopher? The. The lyrics. It's like, I don't care if it hurts. I want to have control. I want to have a perfect body. I want to have a perfect soul. Right? Like shooting for the best, but I'm a creep, I'm a weirdo or what the hell am I doing here? I don't belong here. I mean, how many times has that song been covered? That obviously has resonance for people because so many of us feel it. And, you know, and I think when it comes to behaviors, you know, one of the things that we can do is, you know, find our friends. Find the people that are going to remind you of your competence. Not in a way that blows smoke, but, you know, a trusted peer. Now, you know, I will say sometimes that's hard to find given the world that you occupy. So I think sometimes at senior tables, that can be a tenuous relationship. Maybe everybody's vying for that CEO chair. Right. So that might be a hard place, but in other parts of the organization, I don't think it is. I think mentors. Mentors can really help give us an objective sense of what we do well and where we need to. Where we need to lean in. You know, I've had three people that have contributed to my career that I would assign more praise toward my professional accomplishments than anyone. David Dotlik, Ron Meeks, Vicki Lostetter. All three of them were excellent at telling me what I was good at and where I needed to lean in. And those are the people that you need around you. So, you know, we talk about getting a mentor, and I know earlier in my career, I thought, oh, that sounds fun. I had no idea what purpose they actually served. And those are people to give us that objective dose of reality. What do you do well and what do you need to work on? So I think finding a mentor is another thing that you want to do.

Christopher Camp (47:03)

Oh, I love it. I love it. And I think that that's. We have a previous episode where we talk about getting a mentor, being a mentor, the value of them, and not just one, none of them are perfect. These are not demigods or gurus. These are people that are on their own journey. So get multiple people that can help you. And I think sometimes you're right. Get creative. Maybe it is a co worker or supervisor. Maybe it's a friend. Maybe it's an accountability partner, life partner. Maybe it's a coach. There's all sorts of different options. And maybe it's all of the above, which. Which I think is really helpful.

Cade Cowan (47:37)

Depends on your relationship with that life partner, though, doesn't it?

Christopher Camp (47:39)

It does. Maybe it mentors for certain aspects, but maybe not for all aspects. Yeah. And I'm actually, I'm going to throw back to what you said earlier on the behavior list. I'm going to also add, receive praise and don't reflect it or don't deflect it, which I think is really good. That's. That's something I think we could also add. And then one other thing I want to put on there is I think oftentimes we're guilty of only judging ourselves by the outcome, and the outcome is important. That's usually what we're striving for. But I think it's important to recognize the process and the progress and say, hey, all right, did we have a clear process delineated here and did we follow that process? Yes. Okay. We can take some joy and satisfaction in that now. Maybe we get to the end and we realize we left out some critical steps. Okay. Now we've learned something new. We're going to change the process and update it. But I think if you can do that, don't just judge yourself on the outcomes, but judge yourself on the effort and work that you. That you put into it.

Cade Cowan (48:39)

Let me tell you. You know, I would say that the failures that I've suffered, almost all of them I can attribute to I. Steps outside the process that I know works. And so I do think that you've got to, you know, it. You aren't just judging the outcome. You got to judge the process. You know, it is not. It's about the effort. It's about the process. It's about the discipline. That's what tends to lead to the success that high performers enjoy. And so they got to remind themselves of that oftentimes, particularly if they're feeling that. That sense of being an imposter. One other thing I'd say that really can help is, you know, I. For about 20 years, I've kept an email file that I simply call Keepers, my keeper's file. And, you know, when somebody sends an email that said, you know, I shifted the way they were thinking or, you know, I caused this in their, you know, in some outcome that they were seeking to achieve, I just slide those over into my keepers file. And every now and then when I feel like I'm not up to some task, every now and then I'll. I'll open it up and just, you know, be reminded. So you're kind of retraining your brain on, you know, what are the attributions that led to the success. It wasn't luck you didn't just fake it, but, you know, you contributed to something that resulted in a beneficial outcome for somebody. I keep that file.

Christopher Camp (50:04)

Well, I think your, your keeper file is. I love that concept. I love that idea. I actually have a drawer in my office too. I do the same thing, or I keep all of the notes I get from patients and cards and things, and I keep them in there. And sometimes you do, you just got to open it up and look at it. And I think what that does is it sort of helps reground us in our values and our purpose and our vision. It sort of resets like, oh yeah, this is why I'm here. This is what I'm doing. This is the real thing that I'm, I'm striving for. And so I think that's, that's really great too. And so I'll, I'm going to add that to the list. That's really kind of both a mindset and a behavior thing, so. Well, Kate, this has been a great discussion. I've learned a lot. I've taken a lot of notes. So I'm going to take a couple minutes here and kind of recap my notes. And after I do that, I'm going to have you give us rapid fire answers to our big three questions. So you started us off with definition of imposter syndrome, which is our ability or tendency to explain away our achievements rather than acknowledging our success. And this is usually done in the face of clear evidence that we actually did accomplish the thing or we did actually do the thing. It's different than low self confidence. Low self confidence is saying, I'm not going to do it because I don't think I can. Whereas imposter syndrome, you sort of already have done it or you've already arrived, you made it into the room and then you feel like you don't belong. And I also, I loved how you talked about the difference in sort of imposter syndrome and the Dunning Kruger, where imposter syndrome, we tend to have high levels of competence but low levels of confidence. And then Dunning Kruger is just the opposite. So in that you have high confidence but low competence. There's a lot of downsides to imposter syndrome as well too. So we talk about how it increases anxiety, mental illness, burnout, causes us to overwork. I loved your concept. The zone of proximal development where we have to find the space that challenges us enough but doesn't overwhelm us. And that's kind of how we can balance that growth Mindset with the imposter syndrome. And then we talked about different times when we may be particularly at risk for imposter syndrome. So any new transition, new job, you're in an environment that's full of talented, successful, smart people. If you're a marginalized individual and you're in an environment where you feel like maybe you don't belong or you're the only one who looks or sounds like you do, and then often after previous failures, you got to be careful if that happens. We also talked about signs to look out for, to know if it's happening to you and for you. You gave a great example. Anytime you have that feeling, I just got to get through this. You got to look out for it. You spoke to me on that one because I've definitely been there. And then you gave us, we got a couple sets of different things to look at to try to improve. So both a list of mindset activities and behavioral activities. So on the mindset, give yourself compassion, try to have a growth mindset, and say, I don't know yet. Know that you're not the only one that's struggling with it. This is a pretty universal problem. We also talk about defining your own success and try to tie things back to your core mission, values, and purpose. And on the behavior side, name it when it, when imposter syndrome happens, be sure to name it. Second, you said find friends, which can be really helpful. People who know you, love you and care about you, they can help you. And then take, take the credit when it's given to you. Don't, don't deflect it. So receive the praise, get mentors that can help you, and then also credit yourself for the effort that you give and not just the outcome. So enjoy the process. So that's my summary and I got a lot more that I wrote down here. This was, this was chock full of good information. I'm going to give you a chance to summarize here, Cade. We'll ask you those three big questions again. So number one, what exactly is imposter syndrome and what are the downsides?

Cade Cowan (53:42)

Yeah, the imposter syndrome is when you cannot internalize the success that you're enjoying. I heard it said once, I loved it. Your brain has not caught up to your resume.

Christopher Camp (53:55)

Oh, very good. I love that. Great line.

Cade Cowan (53:58)

You know, and the downsides are, as we said, if you're one who approaches imposter syndrome by over preparing, it's going to be overworked, it's going to be exhaustion, it's going to be burnout. If it's through procrastination, you're going to annoy the people around you and you're going to sit with a nagging fear which is going to just kind of erode your sense of well being. How about that? I'm speaking from personal experience here.

Christopher Camp (54:22)

Yeah, I feel both of those, actually. All right, second big question. How common is self doubt and how can we tell if it's impacting us?

Cade Cowan (54:28)

Yeah, just, you know, it's, it's a universal experience. And I think that's why, you know, it does behoove us to find people that we can talk about with it. You know, it's, it's 70%, as we said, at least 70% of the population at some point is going to feel it. If you're a high performer, you've likely felt it at some point. That was the first part of your question. How common, what was the second part of your question, Christopher?

Christopher Camp (54:51)

How is it impacting us?

Cade Cowan (54:54)

You know, I think it's, it's all the psychological speak aside, you know, isn't it sad that people work as hard as they do and yet can't go home at night with a sense of self satisfaction, with a sense of pride, you know, that, that can then impact the people around them? That's one way I'd describe it. Isn't that sad?

Christopher Camp (55:18)

And then our third one. What steps can we take to overcome imposter syndrome and develop healthy confidence?

Cade Cowan (55:23)

Yeah, sure. So we said name it to tame it.

Christopher Camp (55:26)

Right?

Cade Cowan (55:27)

We said, you know, make sure that you're accepting praise that benefits both you and the person who found the time and the energy and the, the, the niceness to compliment you. You know, we talked about this idea of shifting from I don't know it to I don't know yet. Talked about declaring what we don't know, being transparent about that. It's a sign of humility. It's a sign of confidence. Those are the things that I think are the top of my list.

Christopher Camp (55:51)

Well, you've set this up nicely. I always like to end this with a call to action for our audience. You know, sort of give them the first step. And honestly, you've, you've given them several lists of great steps. So I would tell for our audience, go back to that third section and re. Listen, you know, we talk about all the different mindset things you can work on and also the behavioral things you can work on. And pick one out of those lists. Okay, this is the thing that I'm, I'm going to do. And if if you have no idea what where to start, I'm actually going to encourage you. Start on the on the mindset side, just with having compassion to yourself and recognizing that you're not the only one. In fact, everybody else is doing it sometimes I think just that understanding alone can then give you the confidence you need to move forward and take the next steps. So Kate, thank you so much for joining us. This was a fantastic discussion. I really appreciate it.

Cade Cowan (56:39)

Thanks Christopher. I've enjoyed it a lot.

Christopher Camp (56:40)

Thank you Great. And to our audience, remember to live intentionally, consistently better. Keep striving to be the best human you can be so you can give your gifts back to the world and never stop optimizing thanks for listening to the Mayo Clinic Human Optimization Project. If you like this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. It helps others find us know someone who might benefit. Share the episode with them to join us in our mission to help as many people as possible become the best humans they can be. Have feedback or a topic idea. Email us at optimizeo. Edu and be sure to look for us on Instagram X and YouTube.

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