# Do you feel like an impostor?

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The Braver journal

It was the fall of 2018. There were questions about whether it would be worthwhile to bring other co-founders into Braver. We thought it might be appropriate to involve people from the business community. These people could, among other things, support me in my new role as president. This idea appealed to me, but at the same time it seemed to push me away. I wanted to have support and to be able to learn from someone else, but I was also scared.

![Marie-Lou Gagnon](<https://www.braver.net/blog-assets/39b0cb41df4807f1f2af-960.webp>)

 Marie-Lou Gagnon July 31, 2019

![Do you feel like an impostor?](<https://www.braver.net/blog-assets/legacy-66e973122938a0df54bc-960.webp>)

I think we all have our fears. Some people have more than others and some people say they don't have any. However one thing is certain, when we talk about breaking down the barriers between healthcare professionals, there are sometimes fears and anxieties that emerge, as we mentioned to you in our last [blog post](<https://www.braver.net/en/blog/braver-talk-what-do-the-professionals-think/>).

I believe that the exercise of observing and understanding a fear can be very beneficial. That's why I'd like to explore in more depth some of the fears that professionals have shared with us. But before I tell you about other people's fears, I will first try to act in all humility and share one of my own.

It was in the fall of 2018. And I was afraid to bring people from the business world into our team. I was afraid these people would realize that I didn't have the skills to be the president of Braver. I was afraid that I wasn't up to the task as an entrepreneur. In those moments of doubt when fear comes up, I feel like I'm not good enough to handle all the new tasks that come my way. I have this strong feeling that my skills are not good enough. It's as if a little voice inside me sometimes says to me, "You're not as good as people think you are. In other words, I feel like an impostor.

Apparently, I am not alone in feeling this way. This feeling was first studied and identified in 1978 by American psychologists Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes. In fact, what they call the "impostor syndrome" is quite well-known in our society. Some studies have estimated that 70% of people will experience at least one episode of this phenomenon in their lives (Gravois 2007). It is a rather complex and multi-factorial phenomenon, but it is interesting to note that:

1. some of the main factors identified as contributing to its development include being a woman and being a perfectionist.
2. the family context is very determining

([Sources](<https://www.sciencetheearth.com/uploads/2/4/6/5/24658156/2011_sakulku_the_impostor_phenomenon.pdf>))

I won't give you the psychoanalysis of my childhood, but I can tell you that I'm a perfectionist who doesn't want to fail. I don't want to fail because I internalize a lot of failure. That is to say, if I fail, I am very good at banging my head and blaming it on the lack of a certain competency in me. This trait of my personality, added to my new context as an entrepreneur in a technology startup, a role in which I am somewhat in the minority as a woman, has fostered the emergence of the famous feeling of the impostor.

According to the literature, the syndrome is set on a vicious circle ([sources](<https://www.sciencetheearth.com/uploads/2/4/6/5/24658156/2011_sakulku_the_impostor_phenomenon.pdf>)):

1. The person wants to start a task that might make her proud...
2. The idea of not succeeding creates anxiety, self-doubt and worry.
3. Faced with these emotions, the person is overwhelmed or procrastinates, which provides temporary relief.
4. After the task has been successfully completed, there's a little moment of satisfaction, a tap on the back!
5. Before long, the impostor shows up and undermines this positive feeling by externalizing the responsibility for the success, allowing self-doubt and anxiety to return.
6. Faced with these negative emotions, the person returns to the first step.

Several studies have also been done on healthy students, since it seems that they are more likely to develop this impostor syndrome. One of these studies, carried out on medical students, revealed that nearly a quarter of male students and half of female students experienced impostor syndrome ([sources](<https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5116369/>)). This prevalence among medical students may lead us to believe that the feeling of being a phoney is also more prevalent among other health students. Can these feelings persist after graduation? Most likely, yes.

What I find interesting at this point is not necessarily to diagnose a feeling of impostor among the health professionals around us, but rather to ask whether this feeling could also be responsible for a fear of interpersonal collaboration.

In my case, the feeling of being an impostor made me feel afraid to open up to people I thought were more competent than me in a certain area. Not because I didn't want to, but because I had doubts about myself. So it seemed to me that the easiest solution would be not to expose myself so as not to be unmasked by people who were brimming with competence. Luckily, I didn't let my fear guide me!

Can it be the same with some health professionals when it comes to interprofessional collaboration? At the end of the day, the question remains unanswered, and that's okay.

What I am sure of is that in the fall of 2018, I was afraid, but I was aware of it. This awareness allowed me to observe this pattern rather than just being subjugated to it. That made all the difference, because even though I was afraid, I was still moving in that direction. Fear is not a problem in itself, but it can become one if it becomes the driver of our decisions.