Overcoming Imposter Syndrome as a Business Owner

Kathy (host):
Well, hello there, and welcome back to another episode of the “Help My Business is Growing” Podcast where we explore how to grow and build a business that is healthy and sustainable. I’m your host, Kathy Svetina, fractional CFO and founder of Newcastle Finance Company. We believe that everything you do in your business will eventually end up in your finances, and to get to healthy finances is to have a healthy business. Of course, the question is, how do you get there? Well, this is where this podcast comes in to help.

Kathy (host):
Have you ever wondered why even the most successful people, the ones who seem to have it all, still struggle with imposter syndrome? You know, that nagging, frightening, and sometimes even paralyzing feeling that you’re not good enough, that you’re a fraud, or you’re just faking it, and that you don’t deserve the achievements that you’ve had?

Kathy (host):
Well, in today’s episode, we’re going to be tackling all of that. What is this imposter syndrome? What exactly is it? Where does it come from? Why are so many people affected by it? And how does it impact the workplace, you as a business owner, and your workers? And most importantly, of course, how do we overcome it? What can we do to fix this?

Kathy (host):
As a quick reminder, all of the episodes on this podcast, including this one, come with their own timestamps for topics we discuss, and each one has its own blog post too. So if you’re interested, go take a look at it. You can find all the links and detailed topics on the show notes.

Kathy (host):
My guest today is Andy Hite. He is a recognized leadership coach who supports entrepreneurs, executives, and their teams as they navigate the world of building lives and businesses filled with prosperity, meaning, and freedom. As an accomplished executive and entrepreneur coach, Andy has impacted countless lives and earned a reputation for excellence. He is a sought-after guest, inspiring audiences with insights on how to lead more powerfully, love more deeply, and live more fully. Join us.

Kathy (host):
Andy, welcome to the show.

Andy (guest):
Hey, thank you so much for having me. I’m excited for wherever this conversation takes us.

Kathy (host):
Yeah, thanks so much for being here. You know, when we started doing the prep for this episode, we talked about imposter syndrome. And one of the things that always surprises me about imposter syndrome is, when you look at successful people, like really successful people, even celebrities, for example, they always seem to feel like they’re not good enough. They have this imposter syndrome still, it’s like, how successful do you have to be to have that go away? So since you focus that in your coaching, I wanted to ask you, first if you can explain what imposter syndrome really is, and why do so many people struggle with this?

Andy (guest):
Yeah, imposter syndrome is essentially just a fear, right? It’s a fear that is designed to kind of keep us in our comfort zone, which is where we have some certainty. So typically, the way it manifests is, “I’m not good enough. Who am I to be doing this or achieving this? Who am I to have this authority? Who am I to lead this team?” Like feeling like an imposter, right?

Andy (guest):
Oftentimes, folks, most of us don’t really appreciate our successes and wins, and we look towards the negative, what we’re not doing well, or what we should be doing better. And that is just what I call a survival mechanism that’s designed to kind of keep us safe, right? It’s just a fear. You talked about, at what level do you need to get to no longer have this exist. In fact, typically, the higher one gets in their life career, the more the imposter syndrome shows up, which I think, frankly, is a good thing. It means people are stretching themselves. They’re putting themselves out there, and they’re up to big things. No one ever had imposter syndrome sitting on the couch eating Doritos watching Netflix.

Kathy (host):
Yeah, I could definitely see that. You know, when you said that, there’s always that you expect more and more from yourself. And I could see that in my own business. We just finished two big projects that were in the works for the last probably more than a year at this point. And I personally finished a project that’s been in a word for six months in my personal life, and it’s, when you’re in the middle of doing it, it feels like yes, I’m going to feel so good after this is done and I’m going to rest and after you’re done with it, it’s like okay, what’s next? What’s next? What’s next? It’s always this we don’t take this moment to celebrate and it’s so bad for First of all, because it’s bad for the project. I mean, it’s a really big project that that you wrapped up, take a moment to celebrate it. That’s number one, give it the you know the proper celebration that it needs. And two, it’s so bad for the mental health too and And I’ve noticed this for myself is that I always struggle with making sure that things are wrapped up and celebrated when they really need to be. What’s your take on that?

Andy (guest):
Well, you’re right, we never celebrate appropriately, we have no problem like, giving ourselves 50 lashes if things don’t go well, right, but we don’t celebrate when things do. And frankly, my clients will know, something will happen. And I’ll say, “How are you going to celebrate that? How are you going to celebrate?” Because we have to, like, give ourselves the kudos when it’s deserved. Because it anchors in the fact that we are deserving, that we are good enough, that we have achieved. It helps to build greater levels of confidence, which the greater the levels of confidence, the more courage we can bring to our work. So we have to spend some time celebrating and recognizing all those things that we’re doing really, really well.

Kathy (host):
You know, my theory is, and this is my theory, and you tell me if you see that in your clients, is the reason why the imposter syndrome hits us so hard, is because we don’t take the moment to actually celebrate these big achievements. And when we don’t take a moment to celebrate these achievements, they kind of fade into the background. So when you go forward, and you look back, you almost feel like I have no successes to look back to, which is so not true.

Andy (guest):
Yeah. And that’s why we want to celebrate the wins because it anchors in, it actually just tells us, “Oh, we have achieved this, we’re taking a moment to celebrate it, to commemorate it so that when we get to the moments, we’re potentially questioning our ability, we have something to look to, oh, I actually can run meetings at this level. Because look, I did it. Or I can give this TEDx talk, because I’ve done this or whatever that thing is, we need to spend as much time celebrating our wins as we do mourning our losses.”

Kathy (host):
Yep. Yep. And what are some of the other techniques that you see that work well for your clients? So one is celebrating your wins, obviously. Is there anything else that works really well for people?

Andy (guest):
Yeah, so typically, what we’re doing in coaching is like getting some altitude and on what is real, what is actual fact? Right? Oftentimes, imposter syndrome is just like a voice, right? I don’t know if you’ve ever seen the movie Inside Out on XR, right? It’s just one of those characters in there. It’s like, “You’re not good enough, you’re not good enough. You can’t do that. And you don’t deserve that,” right. And what we want to do is create some awareness that that is just a voice. It’s not reality, so that we can question the narrative that’s going on. Is it true that we’re not good enough to do X, Y, or Z, or that we don’t have the qualifications to lead X, Y, or Z? Typically, if we get some altitude and perspective, we’ll see that no, in fact, we are good enough. It’s just a fear that is mouthing off to keep us safe within our comfort zone. And if we can, then with that awareness, continue to take courageous action will continue to grow, will continue to achieve keeps us in the game.

Kathy (host):
Yeah, and you know, that’s, I hear this all the time, too. And it’s like, you can’t have to take courageous action. But it’s so hard to do it at the moment. And it’s so hard. For everyone. It’s hard, especially if you’re trying to grow as an individual as a business, and you’re going into the territory that you’ve never been to before. So what would you say, for those who are growing, for example, who are growing their business, and they’re doing things that they have not done before in that particular flavor? I would say, but they have done it in different flavors before. And it just feels new. So it’s really hard to think about it. Okay, I’ve done this before. But you have never done the exact thing before like that.

Andy (guest):
Yeah. And that’s where growth happens, right? We don’t grow from doing something we know how to do. Because we know how to do that. I think the trick is to, whether through your own devices that could be journaling or meditation, just get some awareness that this fear is even there. This obstacle is even there, right? If we go to do something new and we find ourselves hesitating, ask what is it that we’re afraid of? What’s the story that’s going on?

Andy (guest):
You know, one that I hear a lot, I heard it this morning, especially with newer entrepreneurs, is, “Well, I need to grow my business but I just can’t afford to invest in it.” And I usually will take folks through an exercise to see if that’s really true. Because when it comes to money, we all have a lot a lot a lot of fears. I bet you know this very, very well. Right. Some are true and real, and some are manufactured because we have a lot of hangups around money. And so typically what we do in any realm is try and get some altitude on the thoughts and beliefs that are driving us and to see what’s actually real. And then we can create actions from there.

Kathy (host):
And you know, it’s interesting when it comes to money, a lot of people have this idea about, you know, lacking the money, and they think, well, the money’s missing, the money’s not there. But what I also see on the other side, which is surprising, and it was surprising to me, too, is when people have a lot of money, especially when the business is doing well, it creates so much anxiety around that, too. That was extremely surprising to me. Because I would think, you know, people have a lot of money, the business has a lot of money in the bank, but no, the owner still has this anxiety about it. Now, it’s like I have this much, it’s burning a hole in my pocket, I’m so afraid I’m going to lose it. Because if you don’t have much, then you’re like, “Well, I’m not going to lose much. But if you have a lot, then this is, I’m going to lose a lot of money if I don’t do this.” Right. So there’s there’s anxiety on both sides. You know, the grass is not always greener on the other side.

Andy (guest):
Yeah, I mean, most of my work is done with highly driven, highly successful people. Because as you say, the higher the level of success, the more stress the higher level of income, the more stress and that stress taxes the system both themselves, if they’re running teams or businesses, it taxes that and only holds them back, right. And so a lot of the work that we do is we question these fears. And most times, there, we see that they’re just stories, it’s not real, we’re not going to lose everything. If X, Y or Z happens. And so most of the work that we do in coaching, you know, those old guys, the Stoics, they knew something with the idea of “Know thyself.” That’s a lot of what we do — know who you are, what makes you tick, what your fears are, what’s true for you what’s not. And when we have that kind of perspective, typically, we’re able to overcome those obstacles a lot quicker.

Kathy (host):
So we talked about, you know, celebrating wins and talked about journaling, we talked about being aware of the stories are happening in your mind, is there anything else that you also find that’s particularly helpful for the clients, I know, that’s the these are definitely the three big ones, but like something that really gives them a breakthrough in this imposter syndrome?

Andy (guest):
The main tool and technique for using coaching is self awareness. Because with awareness comes choice. Most people don’t have choice, if they don’t know that. That’s some thought, belief, perspective or mindset is running them. And so oftentimes, we want to put ourselves in the situation where our fears, or we’re going to hit some friction are getting in the way of us achieving what we want. And then we start to knock them down systematically. Because it’s just typically a story, or a way in which we see the world that was formed from years and years ago. That is the thing that holds us back. And so we use a variety of tools, you know, we use 360 assessments, sometimes other kinds of assessments, that’s pretty rare. But the typical thing that we’re doing is we’re practicing daily, weekly, monthly, self awareness and keeping goals in our sight so that we’re constantly moving toward the direction of our goals.

Kathy (host):
This can go really deep, especially if you have, you know, some childhood trauma is the way how you were raised. It’s, it’s like where’s this line between, you know, coaching and being a therapist almost, it’s, it’s so embedded, because the way how, you know, you were raised in your parents, the way, for example, how money was taken care of in your family, all of it really affects your performance and affects your business. And I always say this, like, if you want personal and professional development on steroids, just go start a business because it will bring out a lot of crap from the previous, you know, the way how you were working in the corporate world if you were there, the way how you work with people, the way like all the family stuff, like where’s the line between, like, how far back do you go? Like, how far back do you need to go to fix this?

Andy (guest):
Yeah, so therapy and coaching are distinct. They are different, right? Therapy’s job is to heal past wounds, to heal mental illness, to heal trauma. And so they look back in order to understand that and to process that, right. In coaching we often do look backwards, but it’s not always necessary. Right? We look back to see oh, I know I understand why I have the money stories I do because my dad was always talking about how there’s never enough. It gives us some context for what the thoughts and beliefs are, but the way that we shift them, you know, through neuroscience and neuroplasticity is that just like in a gym, we just go do the reps, in spite of the thoughts and beliefs that might want to hold us back. And typically what happens is we start to take some courageous action, it gets us some results, which builds our confidence, and new awareness, and it’s a cycle. And so you said, the best way to grow is to start a business. It’s absolutely true. Because by doing so, you are run up against a lot of your own beliefs and fears. And you’re just by definition, I’m having to put food on the table, having to push and that will bring up a lot of stuff that we work on that will cause so much transformation.

Kathy (host):
And how does this process look like? So when someone comes to you, and they’re, I’m always thinking about how does this really look like? Because we’ve talked about journaling, we talked about being aware. But let’s go and try to be practical for a moment. Here, for example, someone is starting to, they have a business is doing well. And now let’s say, for example, they have a team that is not performing well. But they need to go and guide them. They have imposter syndrome because they have never done this before. How would you guide them through that, for example?

Andy (guest):
Excellent question. I mean, we would create first, some clarity around the goals. What is it that you want from your team? What is it that you need from your team? What is it that they’re not currently doing? We might even do a 360 leadership 360 to understand what might be getting in the way of their leadership. And then we use the goals that they have to move them through transformation. So if, for example, communication is the area that we identify that we need to work on, we’re constantly going to be looking at, well, how do we communicate and coach up our team? What are the obstacles? So we actually just do things in real-time and systematically so that we’re learning new skills, practicing new skills, and making sure that they’re translating. If that makes sense?

Kathy (host):
Yeah, it does. And for those who are wondering, what is the leadership 360? How does that look like? And how does that benefit a leader?

Andy (guest):
Great question. Thanks for bringing that up. So a 360 assessment is basically where, for example, if you have an SVP of an organization, we would go in, and we would identify probably eight to 12 key stakeholders, folks, perhaps that they are leading, so people that report to them, maybe their boss, peer or two. Basically, what we’re doing is we’re interviewing through a questionnaire all of those folks to essentially assess that leader, how are they doing? What are their strengths? What are their weaknesses? The leadership circle profile that I use, I believe it identifies 36 different areas of leadership. And it collates all the data that each individual’s putting in, and it gives a picture of their leadership. And so then we can take that data and see, oh, so you have issues, perhaps, with communication, your direct reports don’t feel that you communicate effectively. So basically, it kind of helps to point out for us what’s going well and what are opportunities for growth. And then we use that to create a coaching plan.

Kathy (host):
How do you work with people who have trouble with criticism? Or, I would say, feedback; those who do not take feedback well. How does that work for those people who just don’t want to hear the feedback? All they want is positive feedback. But when it comes to negative feedback, they really struggle with that.

Andy (guest):
Well, the truth is, that’s tricky when it comes to coaching because coaching involves constant feedback and awareness, right? So, if one is cut off from that, they may not be coachable. Now, what I would do with someone in that circumstance is really help them identify, first off, that they’re cut off and shut off from feedback and criticism. Then, we’d look at what meaning they make about receiving feedback, you know? A lot of people will take it as a personal assault. So, we have to reframe for them what the feedback is and what its intent is. If they’re able to grasp that, “Oh, this is actually meant to help me grow and become a better leader, which will, in turn, help my career and my earning capacity,” sometimes we can get them on board to take and receive that feedback in a way where they can grow. But coachability is a big thing.

Kathy (host):
Yeah, and you know, I’m interested in this. Are those people who have imposter syndrome more sensitive to negative feedback than others? Or is there no difference at all? I’m really curious about what you see in your coaching practice.

Andy (guest):
I know folks that are very receptive to feedback and have high levels of imposter syndrome. So, I don’t know that there’s a particular correlation there. It’s just a version of self-doubt. Essentially, it’s fear, right? Anything that holds us back is typically some version of fear, or a belief, which a belief can be a fear. So, if we can get some altitude on those and reframe those thoughts, beliefs, and fears, almost anything becomes possible.

Kathy (host):
Yep. And we talked a lot about if you are the person who has imposter syndrome and a problem with criticism, and how do you manage that. But let’s move into what happens when you are managing someone who has significant imposter syndrome. How does that manifest itself in their work? How does that usually look like when you are a manager and you have to manage someone like that?

Andy (guest):
Typically, they’ll kind of shy away or abdicate responsibility, be self-deprecating, and have somewhat low confidence in their own ability. The way to work with that is to first make sure that there’s psychological safety so that the person feels comfortable with their leader, mentor, and can be vulnerable. Then, that mentor needs to help them reframe, from a coaching perspective, what that employee is experiencing. It happens a lot, right? One of the things that I work on with my clients is leadership, and how to become a better coach as a leader because I think the best leaders coach. They can help that employee gain awareness around their own imposter syndrome or lack of belief in themselves and then build more confidence.

Kathy (host):
And, you know, this is an interesting distinction. Just because you’re a leader, it doesn’t mean that you’re also a coach. If you’re a coach, it doesn’t mean that you’re necessarily in a leadership position. I mean, you can be a peer and still be a coach for someone. So let’s talk a little bit about that. What’s the distinction between leadership and coaching?

Andy (guest):
Surely, I think the best leaders do coach because coaching, by its nature, is a methodology or a way to bring out the very best in people. I think that is the definition of leadership. You know, Simon Sinek says, leadership is not about being in charge. It’s about taking care of those in your charge. It’s not about making sure something gets done, managing the day-to-day, is it done well, on time, and with quality? That’s management, not leadership. Leadership is helping to grow an organization of leaders. I think the janitor can be a leader. Leadership has nothing to do with title. Also, I think the janitor, the clerk, or whomever can be a coach. A coach is just there to help somebody gain more perspective.

Kathy (host):
Have you seen anything that works particularly well for leaders who are trying to be better coaches to their people? Any particular techniques that work really well for that type of leadership style?

Andy (guest):
Yeah, it’s asking a lot of questions and not prescribing. It’s not telling what to do but helping a person find their way. A lot of star performers will get promoted into leadership and then really struggle because performance is not leadership. If, for example, I’m a star salesman and I get promoted into leadership, often what happens is I’ll try to tell people how to do things the way I did it, the way I got results, but that doesn’t always translate. Leadership is about what works for you. How do you take the processes that we have laid out and make that work for you? So, asking a lot of questions rather than telling, being curious, allowing people to stumble a little bit. You know, this is really hard in the business world because any failure is a loss of revenue, right? But if somebody is going to properly grow, think of a child, they’re never going to learn how to run until they stumble while walking first.

Kathy (host):
That’s very true. It’s so hard in the business environment to let that happen and not be tempted to jump in and help. Because you can just see it, like, you could see the profit go down, the revenue go down, or whatever it might be, and it’s painful.

Andy (guest):
Yeah. The best leaders and the best companies allow for that, though.

Kathy (host):
So, how do you build that mentality in the organization, especially in your leadership team, to be able to allow that to happen? Because I think of it as a sense of short-term and long-term pain, right? This is going to be painful in the short term because you’re going to have people stumbling, but they will eventually find their way if you coach them through it. What’s the alternative? If you never do that, then they’re always going to be coming to you for help, and the organization suffers as well.

Andy (guest):
So the organization won’t grow, right? Because growth happens through failure. Think about just the biology of lifting weights, the way in which a muscle grows is that it gets little micro tears and damages, and then it grows back. Right? It’s a little bit of failure here. Same thing in a team, in an organization, in any living, breathing entity, we kind of have to go through these processes. You ask, “How can a company adopt this?” It starts at the top. If the owner, the CEO, the leadership team don’t adopt this as a value, it’s going to be very difficult to move through the ranks because everybody’s going to be looking out for themselves. And they haven’t necessarily had the permission to stumble, as it were.

Kathy (host):
Yep. And how do you model that into the organization? You can have this as a value, like, “We are okay with mistakes. We’ll coach you through it.” But how do you actually have this reverberate through the organization and make sure that, you know, you might have those values, but your managers and your middle management might not have those values? So, how do you make sure that the entire organization has that? And how do you model that? I think that’s the hardest part, right?

Andy (guest):
It is. And like I say, it has to start at the top. We have to see some vulnerability from the CEO, the business owner, the leadership team. We have to, as you say, model, “Hey, we screwed up here. And this is what we learned from it. And this is what we’re going to do from here.” And that has to be part of even the hiring process. You know, when we’re interviewing and bringing people in, this is part of who we are. We’re about growth. We want everybody to fail forward. Because we know, as you say, in the long game, it’s going to pay off. It might cost us $10,000 here, there, right? When you’re building a bicep, you rip it first before it actually starts to grow. It’s taking that long-term approach back to Simon Sinek. He has a great book called “The Infinite Game.” Most of us look quarter by quarter or a year by year. And we really fail to look 10 years down the road and invest in that vision.

Kathy (host):
Yep. And you know, I’m all about healthy and sustainable companies in the long term. But that means you have to play the long game. Because if you’re just looking at what a lot of public companies do, just looking quarter to quarter, making sure that they satisfy their investors quarter to quarter, that is generally not, I mean, it could be in cases, but generally, it doesn’t produce healthy and sustainable companies because you’re always chasing the revenue, chasing the profit. Unfortunately, when you’re doing these growth experiments and you are modeling that mistakes are okay in the short term, but in the long term, we’re going to win, it doesn’t quite correlate with that quarterly performance. So again, just looking at it from a broader view of healthy and sustainable in the long term. That’s where it pays off.

Andy (guest):
Totally agree. Yeah. It takes a lot of awareness and discipline to play the long game, but those that do typically win a lot bigger in the long run.

Kathy (host):
So, Andy, we’ve talked a lot about the imposter syndrome, and we’ve discussed self-awareness and how to play this healthy and sustainable game, so to speak. I always ask this to every single guest at the end of the podcast: If someone is trying to be a better manager and model this type of “mistakes are okay, we’re going to be fine” mindset in their business, where do they start? Where do they even begin, especially if they have a couple of employees and already have a set culture? Now they realize they need to cultivate that mindset of, “Hey, it’s fine.” How do they even do that?

Andy (guest):
Well, I guess it depends on, again, where they are in the hierarchy of the business, right? If it were me, I’d go to my leader and say, you know, this is the team that I want to create. Do I have your support? Right? For them as a leader, I would ask for feedback. How am I doing as a leader, both from above and below? Get feedback because we can only grow with awareness. If we don’t know that something’s a problem, we’re likely not going to change it. So, from the failing forward perspective, I’d get buy-in from as high up as you can go. And then, just from a leadership perspective, get feedback. That’s essentially what the 360 does.

Kathy (host):
That’s great, Andy, and where can people find you?

Andy (guest):
I like to play around a little bit on LinkedIn, and it’s pretty easy to find my website, scalingminds.com. We have a little page set aside for your listeners with some assessments there. I think there’s an ebook on leadership there. And anybody that is curious about coaching can schedule time with me, and we’ll do some coaching complimentary for your listeners. So if you go to scalingminds.com/hmbg, you know, the initials of your podcast, they can find all those goodies there.

Kathy (host):
That’s great. Thank you so much, Andy. That’s, that’s really generous of you. Thanks. And, you know, I hope that people go and find your website and take advantage of those goodies that you give them.

Andy (guest):
Me too. That’s why I created the goodies.

Kathy (host):
Thanks, Andy.

Andy (guest):
Yeah, thank you so much. What a fun conversation.