European Women in Surety Network - Kate Atkin expert in the Imposter Syndrome

It was an absolute pleasure to speak to you all in Madrid for the Women’s Surety Network via the wonders of online technology, on From Imposter to Influencer, understanding and overcoming the imposter syndrome.

Whether or not you personally experience imposter feelings, there is a high likelihood that you will know someone who does. You now also have some strategies which you can implement to help reduce imposter feelings and also to support others.

If there are any issues or questions which have been prompted by our discussions, please feel free to contact me. You can reach me at kate@kateatkin.com or +44(0)7779 646976. You can also follow me on Instagram.

On this page you will find some extra information on the imposter phenomenon (as I explained it isn’t really a syndrome) which is based on my own research and that of other researchers. In addition, there are other useful links, plus suggestions of TED talks and further reading.

A pdf version of the slides is available to download here.

Self-Doubt
While there is no ‘quick fix’ to overcome the imposter chatter, remembering that self-doubt and imposter thoughts are not one and the same can be helpful. Self-doubt is normal and useful if you are doing something for the first, second and maybe third time. Imposter thoughts are where you already have a track record of success, but you have not internalised that success. Remembering the difference and starting to discuss it, helping others talk about it and acknowledging that we are all ‘works in progress’ is a good starting point.

During our planning discussions, Emily, Alice and I talked about the importance of the mantra “let it go”, to help overcome perfectionism. Here’s a useful blog on the topic on Psychology Today’s website.

Remember to acknowledge your own knowledge, skills and abilities – and don’t let those imposter thoughts hold you back. Also remember to give specific, positive, strengths-based feedback to others on a regular basis.

Making Comparisons
There’s a lovely book by Charlie Mackesy called The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse. In there the boy asks the mole “what is the biggest waste of time?” and the mole replies “comparing yourself to others”. Instead of comparing yourself to others, start to compare yourself to yourself and recognise where you have grown, what you have learnt, what skills you have developed. Those experiencing imposter feelings often continue to learn but may not pause to reflect on what they have learnt. Time to pause I’d suggest. The book is available from many bookshops and of course online – and as an animated film (and Charlie Mackesy has a second book out now called Always Remember).

We are still at an early stage in understanding the impact of the Imposter Phenomenon and my interest is in understanding the most effective ways of managing and diminishing those imposter feelings, in particular in the workplace. If you are interested in following my musings please use this link to sign up to receive my (very) occasional newsletter.

Here’s a link to the Imposter Phenomenon podcast series by Rachel Morris: Work Truths, Off the Record (my episode is #2 in the series).
Also, here’s the link to the YouTube video of the inaugural Imposter Phenomenon Awareness Day, held on 27th February 2026, with Dr Terri Simpkin and me.

The media have tended to create a gendered construct around IP and focussed little on the impact organisational culture may have. This Harvard Business Review article goes some way to addressing that bias: Stop telling women they have imposter syndrome

Further notes on other research linked to IP:

Managers and Delegation
The imposter phenomenon may also impact managers’ behaviour: in a study with 190 managers (34.7 percent female) participants were asked to say which of four fictional employees they would delegate three routine tasks and eight challenging tasks to (Bechtoldt 2015). All ’employees’ were described as competent, two were also described as confidence and two as self-doubting. Managers who reported experiencing the imposter phenomenon tended to delegate both challenging and routine tasks to the employees described as having self-doubt. The researchers suggest that if managers were aiming to boost the confidence of self-doubting employees the likely scenario would be that they would delegate the challenging tasks to them and delegate the routine tasks to the confident employees. Instead, the delegation of all tasks to self-doubting employees may indicate the managers are trying to avoid being challenged, as it is unlikely a self-doubting employee would challenge their manager. In addition, the discrepancy in delegating tasks also has the potential to overload some members of the team if the results are transferrable to the workplace.
Personality Types
I am often asked about “types of people” who experience the phenomenon. As I mentioned during the presentation, it can affect anyone who feels as if they don’t belong, or when they look around they feel ‘other’.
So while there is no set “type”, there is some research which explores the links between the imposter phenomenon and personality types, specifically the Five Factor Model: extraversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness, agreeableness and openness to experience.
Two factors report significant finding in research; IP has been negatively related to Extraversion (Chae et al., 1995) and a greater level of consistency has been found in the relationship with Neuroticism, where IP has been found to be positively associated (Ross et al., 2001, Bernard et al., 2002, Vergauwe et al., 2015).
IP has also been found to be negatively associated to Conscientiousness (Chrisman, 1995, Chae et al., 1995, Bernard et al., 2002, Vergauwe et al., 2015), with ‘imposters’ low in two facets in particular: competence (Vergauwe et al., 2015) and self-discipline (Bernard et al., 2002).
Career Development
A paper published by Austrian researchers Neureiter and Traut-Mattausch (2016 & 2017) indicates that experiencing IP can hinder career planning. They suggest that this could be due to a fear of failure. Failure can be wrongly interpreted as “I am a failure”, so to avoid the risk of failure individuals might avoid applying for a promotion.
Perceived Organisational Support
Researchers in America noted that if an individual perceives that their organisation is supportive of them, values their contributions and is concerned for their well-being, then IP feelings are lessened (McDowell et al 2015). Conversely, if the perception is negative, imposter feelings are heightened.
Loneliness and Compassion Fatigue
Another researcher in Israel has found links between imposter feelings and levels of loneliness at executive level in the workplace (Kuna 2019). Kuna describes “the intense experience of having fooled others into an overestimation of one’s ability—in this case, managerial competence—and the anxiety of being exposed as an executive fraud”. Kuna also notes that “the attribution of one’s success to factors other than intelligence or ability, did not surface in the participants’ narratives”.
Loneliness is associated with high levels of anxiety and social alienation (Ernst & Cacioppo, 1999), which can partly explain the link with IP. Clark’s (2021) research with mental health workers observed that IP was positively associated with compassion fatigue and burnout, regardless of age and years of work.

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