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Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

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Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#251

Post by ASalazarMX »

123pie123 wrote: post #218
deanCommie wrote: post #77

A lot of the discussion here is treating impostor syndrome and qualifications as binary: You're either qualified or not. And your evaluation of your skills is either above your actual skills or not. But it's more nuanced than that. I'm a Principal Engineer at a FAAMNG company. I have impostor syndrome all the time. Why? Because I measure myself against 1) role models that are ahead of me in many ways - I've always do…

I can relate to most of the things you've said for me, my imposter syndrome comes mainly when I look around and see everyone working hard and struggling to do stuff well and I feel like I'm not even in 2nd gear and doing as well. So I think I feel like I'm only putting in less then 25% effort and getting 100% of the normal results (relative to others) - it feels wrong, it's like finishing a test or exam too soon and…

Used to be a midrange programmer who others thought as brilliant. It was hard to start two decades ago, but always looking for a challenge meant consistent growth for years. After five years it felt too easy, like cheating. My peers would struggle for a week with what I could deliver in an afternoon.

Seeking better opportunities I migrated to web development, and boy, it's hard to be a novice again. Everyone I worked with was better than me at everything. It's hard to feel like the impostor when you know you're the less skilled one.

Now web development doesn't pay that well, so the natural path was cybersecurity. Still learning, and I feel like this will be my last career change because it takes years to stop feeling dumb and start feeling like an impostor again.

Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#252

Post by yellowapple »

ARandomerDude wrote: post #35
nicolashahn wrote: post #2

Hmm. I don't usually get imposter syndrome. Wait, does that mean this is saying I am an imposter? Oh no, what if I am? But wait, wasn't that thought imposter syndrome? That means I'm not an imposter. Wait, now I'm back to not having imposter syndrome. Oh no.

Your comment is an example of a logical fallacy called "affirming the consequent." Borrowing from Wikipedia, a good example of affirming the consequent is: 1. If an animal is a dog, then it has four legs. 2. My cat has four legs. 3. Therefore, my cat is a dog. The problem is the conclusion is the result of a reversal of the conditional statement. Similarly, you've said, essentially, 1. If I am an imposter, then I wil…

I reckon the point of the comment was to illustrate how the article's premise is rooted in the logical fallacy you describe, and how said fallacy then results in an inability to determine whether oneself is an impostor.

Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#253

Post by wombatmobile »

nonbirithm wrote: post #80
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #8

I guess I just don't really believe this. It sounds nice, and it might even be a good falsehood to tell yourself for personal motivation—but that doesn't make it true. Yes, of course if you're an actual fraudster intending to commit fraud, you're probably comfortable with committing fraud. But feeling "impostor syndrome" colloquially means second-guessing whether you're good enough to deserve your position. There are…

I also believe this. I think "imposter syndrome" has been associated with actual abilities not aligning with lower expectations, with the implication that if you match the description of someone with imposter syndrome, you're just overthinking things and will be just fine. I cannot see how this logically follows in every circumstance that someone feels like an imposter. If you're expected to learn something by someon…

> I feel that hiding behind a notion of imposter syndrome erases notions of personal responsibility when things actually go wrong

Can you say where your sense of personal responsibility comes from? Did you have any personal influences or role models who taught you this protocol? Are there any examples that come to mind that you can succinctly describe here, in a way that shows relevance to the main points you are making?

Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#254

Post by hyperpallium2 »

deanCommie wrote: post #77

A lot of the discussion here is treating impostor syndrome and qualifications as binary: You're either qualified or not. And your evaluation of your skills is either above your actual skills or not. But it's more nuanced than that. I'm a Principal Engineer at a FAAMNG company. I have impostor syndrome all the time. Why? Because I measure myself against 1) role models that are ahead of me in many ways - I've always do…

If you present yourself as equal to one of your role models, you are an imposter.

If you present yourself as the BEST (in the world?) at something, then you are an imposter.

If you present yourself as a perfectly rounded engineer, then you are an imposter.

But if you present yourself as good at the billion things you are good at (even if you find them easy), then you are not an imposter.

5 year old little brother looks up to 8 year old big sister, and turns to her for guidance and protection - and it is right that he should do so.

Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#255

Post by brailsafe »

I think the example given in this is ridiculous. How about someone who is instead not a criminal, but actually has zero evidence of their efficacy in a job or is constantly told otherwise, by means of losing their job or failing to get them, but does feel capable at performing some of the core duties. There is zero to think about after reading it, because apparently if I'm not deliberately trying to steal from my company, then I'm brilliant.

I ask myself this question constantly, because I haven't landed a job in over a year, but I rarely compare myself to others because I don't really believe in it.

Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#256

Post by bertr4nd »

XorNot wrote: post #242
andrewaylett wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>second-guessing whether you're good enough to deserve your position. Often with an element of "what will they do when they realise". I've come to understand, though, that I'd been worrying about the answer to the wrong problem. I know I'm not as good as I could (maybe should) be, and I know that for any given metric I have peers who can and do outperform me. But the word "expectations" is a loaded one: when sufferin…

> Conversely, if your manager tells you that there's a problem and you're not meeting their expectations, they are definitely correct that there's a problem. They might not be correct in their diagnosis, but you can't simply ignore the issue. But there may also be nothing you can do about it either. I think a huge part of the problem is that I suspect the typical experience of hearing "there's a problem" is that by t…

This. This actually hits the nail of my imposter syndrome precisely on the head. I've advanced to a pretty good position, and I'm definitely good at a fair number of things; but there are also things I am very much not good at, and I often worry that I got promoted to this point by "lucky" breaks that leveraged my strengths, but keeping the position will require me to do things that I don't even know how to develop.

Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#257

Post by btown »

saalweachter wrote: post #134
jldugger wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Total derail but: > I'm a Principal Engineer at a FAAMNG company. Does anyone other than a MS employee put an M in FAANG?

I usually use FAAMG instead of FAANG because I don't understand what Netflix is doing in there.

My tongue-in-cheek definition of FAAN(M)G is "does the company have sufficient resources and technical wits to have entire team(s) dedicated to stress-testing and breaking their internal systems proactively to ensure uptime and low latency?" Netflix with Chaos Monkey definitely applies, and Microsoft does as well. Arguably Salesforce would be there too, if not for their meme-worthy historical failure at the low-latency part.

Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#258

Post by lhorie »

deanCommie wrote: post #77

A lot of the discussion here is treating impostor syndrome and qualifications as binary: You're either qualified or not. And your evaluation of your skills is either above your actual skills or not. But it's more nuanced than that. I'm a Principal Engineer at a FAAMNG company. I have impostor syndrome all the time. Why? Because I measure myself against 1) role models that are ahead of me in many ways - I've always do…

Here's an unpopular opinion: this whole thing about impostor syndrome honestly seems like a thinly veiled humble brag. The narrative seems to be "nobody's perfect, but I am aware that I have imperfections so brownie points for me". IMHO, there's no real correlation between confidence and ability.

There are extremely capable athletes with terrible ego problems and there are people that legitimately fall into death spirals. There are those that talk the talk but don't walk the walk, as well as those that quietly sweat away in their pursuit of mastery.

Lacking confidence in something, judging oneself, etc are just being human. Pretty much everyone goes through that. Sure, some might project confidence in the face of the unknown, but that's just one of many coping mechanisms we have. "Laughing to not cry", screaming in fear when startled by a spider, YOLO, panic lies, etc are other similar mechanisms where we do seemingly illogical things in response to the respective stimulus.

And of course, people are multidimensional and topics/disciplines are multidimensional. You can't possibly be great at everything, but most are certainly capable of getting very good at something (even if that something is being a generalist in software engineering - which is itself a form of specialization in the grand scheme of society). And you might experience impostor syndrome at work but still be one of those people that think they're above average drivers or some such. Or you might experience it and be confident about your looks. Etc.

When you consider that reality isn't a flat 2D grayscale spectrum, it seems fairly normal that one would experience discomfort with their lackings when compared against one of infinite arbitrary scales.

Re: Actual impostors don't get impostor syndrome

#259

Post by gavodavo »

armchairhacker wrote: post #228
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #8

I guess I just don't really believe this. It sounds nice, and it might even be a good falsehood to tell yourself for personal motivation—but that doesn't make it true. Yes, of course if you're an actual fraudster intending to commit fraud, you're probably comfortable with committing fraud. But feeling "impostor syndrome" colloquially means second-guessing whether you're good enough to deserve your position. There are…

> good enough to deserve your position What does this mean? What qualifies as "good enough"? If you're not fired, you're good enough for your boss. There are billions of people from poor regions who would put in way more effort than you. Many of them are smarter too. You make $100K / year to spend 35 hours / week drinking coffee and writing JavaScript, they make like $10K / year to spend 60 hours / week physical labo…

So in the end what's important is if you're good enough for _yourself_
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