Working through Imposter Syndrome

I wanted to blog about imposter syndrome because I feel like it's a topic that often gets overlooked.  I wouldn't be surprised if many consultants had similar feelings of anxiety about job performance and getting called out for being a "fraud."  I heard about imposter syndrome my first or second semester of graduate school, but I know of other students who are in their fourth or fifth year and had never been told by friends or professors that imposter syndrome is real, and it affects many of us.

I was nervous about becoming a writing consultant.  I had been a teaching assistant in previous years, so I'm used to working with students on class assignments, but, when I got the job as a writing consultant, a little bit of imposter syndrome popped up and I thought, "What if I can't really do this?  What if I can't write well and I'm terrible at this?"  My first week, I observed several sessions with some superb consultants, and my first couple of solo sessions went fine.  But then I had a session that didn't go so great; in fact the writer told me it had not been helpful for them at all.  Another writer was surprised when I couldn't just look at a list of citations and tell if they were in correct APA format.   I thought, "That's it.  People are going to know for sure that I'm a fake because I need to use the style book."  Not to mention that I'm getting a master's degree, and many of my colleagues are on the Ph.D. track.

One of the best ways I work through my own imposter syndrome is by being a client of the Writing Studio myself.  Not only does it help me with my own writing, but it makes me a more humble learner and a better consultant.  I learn new strategies about how to help writers, I'm reminded of how it feels to be on the receiving end of feedback, and I acknowledge that I never think my consultant is a fake if they don't know the answer to a random question off the top of their head. I don't have to be amazing at every aspect of the English language. I'm not a content expert on every topic.  I'm much better at Chicago or MLA formatting than APA.  But I am a good consultant.  And so are you.

By Jennifer Iceton, M.A. in Women's and Gender Studies (2015) and Geography (in progress)