Impostor Syndrome is the feeling that you aren’t actually qualified for the work you are doing and will be discovered as a fraud. It is prevalent among women in open tech/culture, many of whom have been socialised to value other’s opinion of their work above their own, and to do things “by the book.” Impostor syndrome is a common reaction to doing publicly visible and publicly criticised work like that done in open technology and culture.
The Ada Initiative has several resources to address Impostor Syndrome:
In-person training
We ran several in-person training sessions on how to overcome Impostor Syndrome, including at all seven AdaCamps. Below are the slides, facilitator’s guide, and handout, all licensed CC BY-SA. You are welcome to reuse, modify, or sell these materials.
- Slides and presentation notes (PPT) (PDF)
- Handout
- Facilitator’s guide
Guide to fighting impostor syndrome
Our USENIX blog article Impostor Syndrome-Proof Yourself and Your Community has a number of weapons against impostor syndrome! We released this article Creative Commons BY-SA so that you can modify and re-distribute them in your community.
Writing exercises
Ada Initiative advisor Leigh Honeywell created a values exercise to combat Impostor Syndrome. Leigh’s exercise is based on Miyake et al’s finding that writing about one’s values helps combat stereotype threat. Participants identify five values that are important to them, and write about one value. The worksheet also asks them to describe a time when they were asked for advice or treated as an expert. With this short simple exercise, students are primed for a more realistic, positive assessment of their own ability and achievements.
The worksheet is available online under Creative Commons Attribution.
Ada Initiative 2011–2015 