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Imposter syndrome such a popular thing to belive in because actually most people really do suck at their jobs. I see a similar sentiment all the time where peo

Imposter syndrome such a popular thing to belive in because actually most people really do suck at their jobs. I see a similar sentiment all the time where people say things along the lines of "Nobody really feels like an adult, we are all just muddling through" etc etc. Actually no, some of us actually have our shit sorted out and are actual adults.

MaxBarraclough 6y ago
> Imposter syndrome such a popular thing to belive in because actually most people really do suck at their jobs. The question then is whether there's a correlation between professional confidence and job performance.
- loopz 6y ago
  Is the metric individual job performance, or outcome on the whole?
- hnarn 6y ago
  Both "professional confidence" and "job performance" are hard, if not impossible, to quantify, so I'm not sure how one would even begin to answer that question.
  - MaxBarraclough 6y ago
    Professional confidence isn't hard to quantify. Give a quiz with scoring from 1 to 10. Job performance may be easy to quantify depending on the job role. For students, it's trivial.
baxtr 6y ago
True that. Dunning Kruger still applies
65536 6y ago
> I see a similar sentiment all the time where people say things along the lines of "Nobody really feels like an adult, we are all just muddling through" etc etc. To me, when I used to feel like this a few years ago, it was not about the fact that I didn’t have my stuff sorted (which is also true that I hadn’t), but rather that it turned out that what I thought adult life was about when I was little turned out to not be true. Since then I have been able to reconcile that, and to work out a direction that I am pursuing. One footnote to that though, is that I am still not an adult in the traditional sense of having financial security and a spouse. But I am working towards that.
martindbp 6y ago
Yes, one particular pet peeve for me is the idea that the personal finance part of "adulting" is hard. It's really not. Live (far) below your means and invest the difference, that's it. Somehow 1.3B Chinese can maintain an average savings rate of 30%, but people in the west cannot help but live paycheck to payceck? Of course, few people are willing to actually go through with it, but it's not difficult to understand. It so happens that getting this part right is a pretty major part of adulting too.
- Hackbraten 6y ago
  Don’t assume that what’s easy for you is easy for everyone else. There’s more to getting out of debt than just basic math. I’ve been trying to keep track of my expenses for more than 20 years but no success so far. I do have online banking and a list of contracts but there’s no way for me to figure out how much money I actually have left. Because for example, that yearly medical copay may be around the corner. I have no idea how to account for it, or how to spread it over the months while still keeping track of how much disposable income I actually have at any given time. And that’s just one example. Please be aware that not everyone is financially literate.
  - heavenlyblue 6y ago
    You don’t know how much money you have left because sitting down and actually doing the maths require time and continuous effort. What’s with the copay? Can’t you estimate that from previous year? Many of my friends are like this, especially the ones I lived with: they come to you and ask how much money they owe you thinking that you’ve got this magical ability to count money while it just doesn’t fit in their head that I actually did spend my (considerable amount of) time on doing the maths (including learning how to do the maths). My parents from Lithuania know exactly how to go around relevant tax law in the country (and everyone they know also know how to do that). They know that because they earn so little that it actually makes a huge difference. And to make it clear I come from a background where having any sorts of education is rare so it’s not like they are privileged enough to know it.
  - martindbp 6y ago
quickthrower2 6y ago
Yep compared to someone in the 51st percentile, most of us suck!
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
bArray 6y ago
> [..] most people really do suck at their jobs. If fact, 50% of people perform below average! 50% of the population also have below average IQ. > Actually no, some of us actually have our shit sorted out > and are actual adults. I believe that everybody has an "inner child", but most functioning adults have built layers around that inner self to enhance their behaviour to that of what we externally perceive as an "adult". Proof that most people still have that inner child can be observed in some edge cases, such as under the influence of drugs, sleep/energy deprived, some mental deterioration conditions such as dementia - and many others. I think sometimes we see this too in viral videos where people behave strangely when presented in an unusual scenario. The mind just seems to go into a "default" mode. I think for the most part, people generally run on auto-pilot. Like the so-called "muscle memory" for athletes, I believe something similar exists for most tasks a person completes day-to-day. Human behaviour more generally is likely doing this. To that extent, is this seeming lack of adult-like behaviour simply a person that needs to relearn this "outer shell"? (Assuming they are also capable of doing so.)
- kubanczyk 6y ago
  > 50% of people perform below average Nitpick but it's "median" not "average". > everybody has an "inner child", but most functioning adults have built layers And that's the point where I'm scratching my head. What do people even mean by that? As I observe the "inner child" in others and then apply the new theory to myself it's freaking obvious that the adult part is doing all the reading, all the predicting, all the planning, all the outwitting of the child, all the building, all the self-updating, all the $dayjob. Who is writing this text? I am - the adult part. I am who has 99% of control of the communication at this moment. (At a different time the show can be 50% mine. Or 1%. But when writing, the inner child is mostly shunned, I think he cannot even write too well at all.) And so I protest calling me "an outer shell" that you think you can just simply "re-learn". I am no shell. And I'm definitely not outside! I am the first class citizen, I just happen to have a very silent/weird/energetic/stupid/shy roommate. If I try less, he will have more control. If I try harder, he will have less. Balance. But the balance that is maintained solely by me, i.e. by the adult part - the inner child is not able to do that!
  - 6y ago
jstummbillig 6y ago
Certainly. But then again claiming that most people suck at their jobs does not particularly scream "has sorted shit out", when in fact, on average, people are average at their jobs -- so maybe at least in some of these cases there's still some room left for healthy self-doubt.
- pnutjam 6y ago
  People are average at their jobs is not necessarily true. One competent person can cover for at least 2 or 3 below average people, maybe more.
eplanit 6y ago
Yes. To claim to have Imposter Syndrome is really a form of humblebrag, and often a way of seeking validation. "No, you really _are_ smart and capable"
- dilandau 6y ago
  Exactly. It also provides a bandaid for their self image, and provides an excuse for being ignorant or mediocre. I've only ever observed mediocre people talk about imposter syndrome. Seems like the author is trying, politely, to express a similar idea.
yelloweyes 6y ago
lol sure thing bud you are the one who has shit figured out how arrogant to think you know anything in this vastly complex world. you don't have anything figured out. you're just arrogant and have a narrow view of the world.
hnarn 6y ago
> Imposter syndrome such a popular thing to belive in because actually most people really do suck at their jobs. Most people who I have encountered that are really really bad at their job do not suffer from impostor syndrome, because the whole point of impostor syndrome is that you are open to your own vulnerability and your own incompetence. The people that are exceedingly and amazingly bad at their jobs are often bad because they refuse to learn, because they don't feel they need to. They don't practice humility, they don't ask open questions to learn and they don't improve their processes over time. So while it's easy to kick in an open door and say "everybody can't be smart so some 'impostors' must actually be bad at their jobs" I think it's more useful to take a step back and try to focus on what behaviors and mindsets lead to development and growth, and which do not. I strongly believe that having impostor syndrome rarely correlates with refusing to learn due to one being convinced of one's own brilliance.
- verylittlemeat 6y ago
  >The people that are exceedingly and amazingly bad at their jobs are often bad because they refuse to learn, because they don't feel they need to. Humble impostors can "evolve" into arrogant incompetents. If you're praised for something you don't really understand it can lead to all kinds of unpleasant psychological dissonance. Money + power + embracing that everyone is a fraud who is just "faking it to make it" and you end up with people who are defensively and openly hostile about their knowledge.
vharuck 6y ago
Imposter syndrome is hard to evaluate because it's comparing three levels of skill: 1. Your skill 2. The skill required to do your job well 3. (Implicitly) The skill of your peers The third one is what gets a lot of people who don't directly work with peers. In that case, one can only go by what one hears. And people who blog are self-selected and biased toward having high skills. The non-self-promoting experts are famous for doing great work, so they're even more likely to have high skills. But I think #2 needs to taken into account. You may not be an expert in your field. But if everyone you work with comes to you for help with a task, and you're able to help them, then you're the in-house expert. Unless you want to be a expert among experts, that's not bad.

MaxBarraclough 6y ago

> Imposter syndrome such a popular thing to belive in because actually most people really do suck at their jobs. The question then is whether there's a correlation between professional confidence and job performance.

loopz 6y ago
Is the metric individual job performance, or outcome on the whole?
hnarn 6y ago
Both "professional confidence" and "job performance" are hard, if not impossible, to quantify, so I'm not sure how one would even begin to answer that question.
- MaxBarraclough 6y ago
  Professional confidence isn't hard to quantify. Give a quiz with scoring from 1 to 10. Job performance may be easy to quantify depending on the job role. For students, it's trivial.

baxtr 6y ago

True that. Dunning Kruger still applies

65536 6y ago

> I see a similar sentiment all the time where people say things along the lines of "Nobody really feels like an adult, we are all just muddling through" etc etc. To me, when I used to feel like this a few years ago, it was not about the fact that I didn’t have my stuff sorted (which is also true that I hadn’t), but rather that it turned out that what I thought adult life was about when I was little turned out to not be true. Since then I have been able to reconcile that, and to work out a direction that I am pursuing. One footnote to that though, is that I am still not an adult in the traditional sense of having financial security and a spouse. But I am working towards that.

martindbp 6y ago

Yes, one particular pet peeve for me is the idea that the personal finance part of "adulting" is hard. It's really not. Live (far) below your means and invest the difference, that's it. Somehow 1.3B Chinese can maintain an average savings rate of 30%, but people in the west cannot help but live paycheck to payceck? Of course, few people are willing to actually go through with it, but it's not difficult to understand. It so happens that getting this part right is a pretty major part of adulting too.

Hackbraten 6y ago
Don’t assume that what’s easy for you is easy for everyone else. There’s more to getting out of debt than just basic math. I’ve been trying to keep track of my expenses for more than 20 years but no success so far. I do have online banking and a list of contracts but there’s no way for me to figure out how much money I actually have left. Because for example, that yearly medical copay may be around the corner. I have no idea how to account for it, or how to spread it over the months while still keeping track of how much disposable income I actually have at any given time. And that’s just one example. Please be aware that not everyone is financially literate.
- heavenlyblue 6y ago
  You don’t know how much money you have left because sitting down and actually doing the maths require time and continuous effort. What’s with the copay? Can’t you estimate that from previous year? Many of my friends are like this, especially the ones I lived with: they come to you and ask how much money they owe you thinking that you’ve got this magical ability to count money while it just doesn’t fit in their head that I actually did spend my (considerable amount of) time on doing the maths (including learning how to do the maths). My parents from Lithuania know exactly how to go around relevant tax law in the country (and everyone they know also know how to do that). They know that because they earn so little that it actually makes a huge difference. And to make it clear I come from a background where having any sorts of education is rare so it’s not like they are privileged enough to know it.
- martindbp 6y ago

quickthrower2 6y ago

Yep compared to someone in the 51st percentile, most of us suck!

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

bArray 6y ago

> [..] most people really do suck at their jobs. If fact, 50% of people perform below average! 50% of the population also have below average IQ. > Actually no, some of us actually have our shit sorted out > and are actual adults. I believe that everybody has an "inner child", but most functioning adults have built layers around that inner self to enhance their behaviour to that of what we externally perceive as an "adult". Proof that most people still have that inner child can be observed in some edge cases, such as under the influence of drugs, sleep/energy deprived, some mental deterioration conditions such as dementia - and many others. I think sometimes we see this too in viral videos where people behave strangely when presented in an unusual scenario. The mind just seems to go into a "default" mode. I think for the most part, people generally run on auto-pilot. Like the so-called "muscle memory" for athletes, I believe something similar exists for most tasks a person completes day-to-day. Human behaviour more generally is likely doing this. To that extent, is this seeming lack of adult-like behaviour simply a person that needs to relearn this "outer shell"? (Assuming they are also capable of doing so.)

kubanczyk 6y ago
> 50% of people perform below average Nitpick but it's "median" not "average". > everybody has an "inner child", but most functioning adults have built layers And that's the point where I'm scratching my head. What do people even mean by that? As I observe the "inner child" in others and then apply the new theory to myself it's freaking obvious that the adult part is doing all the reading, all the predicting, all the planning, all the outwitting of the child, all the building, all the self-updating, all the $dayjob. Who is writing this text? I am - the adult part. I am who has 99% of control of the communication at this moment. (At a different time the show can be 50% mine. Or 1%. But when writing, the inner child is mostly shunned, I think he cannot even write too well at all.) And so I protest calling me "an outer shell" that you think you can just simply "re-learn". I am no shell. And I'm definitely not outside! I am the first class citizen, I just happen to have a very silent/weird/energetic/stupid/shy roommate. If I try less, he will have more control. If I try harder, he will have less. Balance. But the balance that is maintained solely by me, i.e. by the adult part - the inner child is not able to do that!
- 6y ago

jstummbillig 6y ago

Certainly. But then again claiming that most people suck at their jobs does not particularly scream "has sorted shit out", when in fact, on average, people are average at their jobs -- so maybe at least in some of these cases there's still some room left for healthy self-doubt.

pnutjam 6y ago
People are average at their jobs is not necessarily true. One competent person can cover for at least 2 or 3 below average people, maybe more.

eplanit 6y ago

Yes. To claim to have Imposter Syndrome is really a form of humblebrag, and often a way of seeking validation. "No, you really _are_ smart and capable"

dilandau 6y ago
Exactly. It also provides a bandaid for their self image, and provides an excuse for being ignorant or mediocre. I've only ever observed mediocre people talk about imposter syndrome. Seems like the author is trying, politely, to express a similar idea.

yelloweyes 6y ago

lol sure thing bud you are the one who has shit figured out how arrogant to think you know anything in this vastly complex world. you don't have anything figured out. you're just arrogant and have a narrow view of the world.

hnarn 6y ago

> Imposter syndrome such a popular thing to belive in because actually most people really do suck at their jobs. Most people who I have encountered that are really really bad at their job do not suffer from impostor syndrome, because the whole point of impostor syndrome is that you are open to your own vulnerability and your own incompetence. The people that are exceedingly and amazingly bad at their jobs are often bad because they refuse to learn, because they don't feel they need to. They don't practice humility, they don't ask open questions to learn and they don't improve their processes over time. So while it's easy to kick in an open door and say "everybody can't be smart so some 'impostors' must actually be bad at their jobs" I think it's more useful to take a step back and try to focus on what behaviors and mindsets lead to development and growth, and which do not. I strongly believe that having impostor syndrome rarely correlates with refusing to learn due to one being convinced of one's own brilliance.

verylittlemeat 6y ago
>The people that are exceedingly and amazingly bad at their jobs are often bad because they refuse to learn, because they don't feel they need to. Humble impostors can "evolve" into arrogant incompetents. If you're praised for something you don't really understand it can lead to all kinds of unpleasant psychological dissonance. Money + power + embracing that everyone is a fraud who is just "faking it to make it" and you end up with people who are defensively and openly hostile about their knowledge.

vharuck 6y ago

Imposter syndrome is hard to evaluate because it's comparing three levels of skill: 1. Your skill 2. The skill required to do your job well 3. (Implicitly) The skill of your peers The third one is what gets a lot of people who don't directly work with peers. In that case, one can only go by what one hears. And people who blog are self-selected and biased toward having high skills. The non-self-promoting experts are famous for doing great work, so they're even more likely to have high skills. But I think #2 needs to taken into account. You may not be an expert in your field. But if everyone you work with comes to you for help with a task, and you're able to help them, then you're the in-house expert. Unless you want to be a expert among experts, that's not bad.