On really (probably) not being an impostor

Hi, I'm Ryn, and I'm not an impostor.

Impostor syndrome is something that I find myself thinking about a fair amount. It's something that I've struggled with quite a bit over the course of my years in the industry so far, and despite numerous people telling me otherwise, it took a long time for me to stop feeling that I was going to be "found out" at any moment. Even so, it still rears its head from time to time. This fall I was the TA for two out of four sessions of a Girl Develop It class on linux, and before it started I was worried that my skills wouldn't be up to snuff. With over 10 years of linux experience, I was concerned that I wouldn't know enough for even an introductory course. As it turns out, I was perfectly fine, and I was able to realize that my lack of confidence was unfounded. After making plans to do some more TA work or even teach a class myself, I started thinking about what had helped me get to this point where I was starting to feel solid about not being an impostor.

I set goals for myself.

Two years ago, I put together a five year plan. Or rather, I put together a list of things that would look like "success" to me. I wanted to speak at Velocity. I wanted to work at Etsy. And I accomplished both of those things (three years ahead of schedule!). This isn't to say that these are the requirements for not feeling like an impostor, but setting goals helps keep me from moving the goalposts on myself. When I set a measurable goal, something that would make me feel successful, I can't then later say to myself, "oh, that doesn't count." It also gives me things to work towards, and helps me to detail some of my accomplishments, which I can then look back on and realize that I've actually done things.

I get multiple sources of feedback. 

One of the hallmarks of impostor syndrome is not being able to internalize positive feedback from external sources. When I started out, however, my external feedback was negative. I got told I wasn't a "real sysadmin". I had people saying that I wasn't good enough for the job I had or the job I wanted. That was tough - as I later learned, I was a real sysadmin and I was good enough, but those experiences had the effect of mis-calibrating my internal barometer for my own skills as well as making me doubt myself an incredible amount. I eventually realized that I shouldn't give too much weight to any one source of feedback.

When we got the feedback for our panel on women in operations at Velocity New York, there was one fairly negative review amidst the rest of the positive ones. Of course, that was the one that stuck out in my mind, and it bothered me - we all put a lot of effort into our panel and it was disappointing that someone wasn't happy with what we did. I talked this over with our moderator, the awesome Lara Hogan, and she gave me a piece of advice that someone had previously passed on to her: "I give you permission to ignore this one." Yes, it's important to listen to feedback, the negative as well as the positive. But not all feedback is created equal, and if you get feedback from multiple sources you can figure out which pieces, if any, are outliers. Figuring out which feedback to internalize and which to discard is a skill just like any other, and it's important to get good at dealing with feedback in order to improve yourself.

I keep challenging myself. 

As I find myself feeling less like an impostor, I want to make extra sure that I don't go too far in the other direction and fall victim to the Dunning-Kruger effect. I could start resting on my laurels, and say, "oh, I spoke at Velocity, therefore I know everything, the end". But then I might easily get complacent, and that's not what I want at all. So I keep doing things that challenge me. I'm applying to speak at conferences, even though public speaking isn't my favorite thing. I'm blogging, to keep working on my writing skills. I'm working with people whose work I've looked up to for years. In all areas, I'm continually learning, continually improving, and by focusing on the work and the things that I'm deliberately doing, I can also keep myself from attributing any of my successes to luck, instead of my own effort.

It's not a perfect system. I do still have moments when I worry that I'm not good enough to be where I am, and that if I publicly say I'm not an impostor that someone will come right back and tell me I am. But overall, I've really come into my own this past year, figuring out not only what I'm capable of but how to recognize myself for it.