After nine years focused on eliminating imposter syndrome in leaders and two best-selling books on the subject, you might be surprised that I’ve realised I had it wrong!
You know that constant hum of stress, the sleepless nights, the moments you regret snapping at someone? I used to think that was just imposter syndrome – feeling like a fraud when you’re not. But I’ve realised it goes deeper.
OK, I haven’t been completely wrong 😊 The imposter syndrome facts I’ve been teaching are still true;
✅ It’s not your personality
✅ It affects men and women equally
✅ It is not a beginner’s issue
✅ Removing the root cause makes it melt away
These are all 100% correct. But I was wrong on a nuance.
Over 70% of high achievers experience imposter syndrome, and it has a significant impact on their performance. I’ll explain how in a little bit.
So I concluded that imposter syndrome is the biggest block to executive performance and success. Here I was wrong, there’s an even bigger and more pervasive drag on peak performance.
The Key Point
I’ve been sharing the graphic below about the symptoms of imposter syndrome for several years now. It’s a self-sustaining cycle of behaviours, self-doubting thoughts and stress reactions.
As I’ve now realised, the crux of this cycle lies at one point. The word ‘danger’ on this diagram above.
This is the point at which the brain identifies the self-doubting thoughts as a threat to survival. This is a lightning-fast mechanism – the amygdala in the brain detects a threat and activates the nervous system to enter a fight-or-flight or freeze state. It reacts a few milliseconds faster than your logical brain can analyse it.
Think of an object moving fast towards your head. You don’t stand there and ponder whether that’s a stone or a cricket ball – you just duck. No thinking required. This is how your threat system is supposed to work to keep you safe; it’s a natural, healthy response. Nothing to do with intellect, mindset, planning or analysis. That is, we can’t think ourselves out of reacting.
Nervous System and Performance
When your nervous system is triggered, there is a cascade of physiological reactions.
1. Blood flow is diverted to large muscle groups for a physical response, but takes that blood from your prefrontal cortex – the logical thinking and strategic planning part of the brain. This means you literally don’t have the resources to think most clearly. The result is poorer decision-making, IQ lowers by 13 points, and creativity drops by 50%.
2. The prefrontal cortex also regulates emotional responses, and so we become more reactive, defensive and less cooperative and understanding. Heightened tensions disrupt team meetings, decisions and all interactions with anger, anxiety or overwhelm.
3. Stress hormones of cortisol and adrenaline are released and can stay in the bloodstream for up to four hours unless you can restore them. This means one triggered response has you activated and operating below your capabilities for half a day. Ever walked out of a meeting and felt wiped for the whole afternoon? That’s why. Two triggers, and your whole day is affected.
4. Your triggered nervous system acts as an alarm bell to those around you (tension, breathing, tone of voice, movements and expressions). It communicates ‘danger’ to other people, whose nervous systems get triggered in response.
Again, this is how a healthy nervous system is supposed to operate in individuals and groups. It’s not a full-out emergency response either; it can be more subtle, lower levels of activation, but it creates the same effects anyway
The problem for work performance is that the amygdala detects more than just physical threats. In that split second, your brain can’t tell the difference between a tiger in the room or a raised eyebrow from your CFO.
It automatically determines that these are also ‘survival threats’;
➡️ An insult or criticism (to be disapproved can mean ejection from the group, and for our caveman ancestors, this would have equalled a death sentence)
➡️ Making a mistake (consequences could be losing your income, which the amygdala sees as a survival threat)
➡️ Losing control of a conversation (the amygdala interprets as a risky vulnerability)
➡️ A surprise or change in routine (the brain cannot predict events so well, so it feels unsafe = threat)
➡️ Loss of attention from others (the brain sees that as part way to ejection from the group)
➡️ Imposter syndrome (feeling like you don’t belong and will be found out would also mean ejection from the group.)
All of these are everyday situations to which the amygdala reacts day in, day out. This creates long-term stress and can drive burnout as we try to put out these perceived fires. In turn, the stress communicates back to the brain that we are under frequent danger, which makes the amygdala more vigilant and reactive.
These triggered responses are present in nearly everyone (99.99% of people), according to Dr Carl Rogers in the 1950s, one of the pioneers of personal psychology. At the time, it was thought we could not change how the amygdala assesses threat, so this was considered to be simply the human condition with no hope of change.
Modern Neuroscience
Over the last few decades, the concept of neuroplasticity has been discovered – that under certain conditions, the adult brain can change in specific ways.
Then, in the last 10 years, neuroscience has determined the neurochemical mechanisms which provide a map – the exact steps to change a threat perception in the amygdala. It’s a systematic, easy, 10-minute process to change reaction to one threat so that the brain permanently stops being triggered by it. The removal of the threat trigger. It is revolutionising the field of psychology.
It’s also the process that I use in my 90-day programme to eliminate imposter syndrome. Removal of the triggers to self-doubt means that you forget to doubt yourself, remain calm, don’t take things personally and stay present and operating at your maximum capability. Imposter syndrome gone.
More Than Imposter Syndrome
Although I knew that removing the triggers eliminated imposter syndrome, I hadn’t previously narrowed it down to changing the brain’s response. I’d seen it as reducing all symptoms.
It was pointed out to me by a group of coaches that I’ve been training in my Inner Success method over the last year. They challenged me directly – ‘this programme is not just solving imposter syndrome, it’s a deep-level leadership transformation.’
This isn’t just fixing self-doubt. It’s eliminating reactivity itself. It’s making leaders unflappable, cultures cohesive, and onboarding frictionless.
So they’ve taken it further …
🚀 One coach is using Inner Success in a leadership programme for talented but reactive leaders whose triggered behaviour is disruptive
🚀 Another is using it with dysfunctional leadership teams to foster understanding, collaboration and strong team cohesion
🚀 One more is using it in executive onboarding and even preboarding to build fantastic resilience, cultural integration and faster results with low stress
🚀 Another is using it for career progression, to prepare their clients to take their next big steps at their very best
🚀 And I am now using it for whole exec teams to massively improve their team performance with an exponential impact since everyone makes the transformation
This essential leadership upgrade of removing reactive triggers applies to every leader because, as Carl Rogers said, we all have them embedded. It’s not about just fixing imposter syndrome, or team dysfunction or reactive patterns.
Removing reactive triggers is the ultimate in performance improvement at every level of leadership.
Imagine a leadership culture where no one is reactive. Where stress doesn’t spread like wildfire. Where leaders walk into pressure and feel calm, clear, connected, that’s not theory.
That’s what’s possible now.
*This article was first published on LinkedIn The High-performance Executive Newsletter by Tara Halliday
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/i-wrong-imposter-syndrome-tara-halliday-om9de