Navigating Imposter Syndrome During Career Transitions

Untitled - March 13, 2026

Speaker Hello and welcome to Courage Loading, where we talk about what it really takes to lead yourself through change. I'm your host, Alicia Noble, leadership coach and career transition strategist, and I help women navigate the messy middle of career transitions because real change isn't just about what you do next, it's about who you're becoming in the process. The identities you're shedding, the beliefs you're rewriting, and the courage it takes to lead yourself through it all. I believe every story of change begins with a single moment of courage. And this is where I help you find yours. So let's dive in. Have you ever noticed that imposter syndrome shows up at the most annoying times? The time when you want to bring your A game and show up as the best version of you the confident, capable and courageous you when you get the promotion. When you finally make the pivot you've been dreaming about. When you walk into a room you've worked so hard to get into. And suddenly think, what am I doing here? You've got the track record, the experience, the years of showing up in spaces that weren't designed for you. And yet there's that voice. The voice that whispers. What if they find out? What if this is the moment they see through me? What if it's all been luck and my luck's about to run out? If you recognize this voice, you're in good company. Today we're going to talk about imposter syndrome. No, it's not the version where I tell you to believe in yourself a little bit more. It's the deeper stuff. What is it actually? And why does it get loudest when you're in a transition period? And how do you take back control? So what is imposter syndrome? Pauline Klontz and Suzanne Amos first labeled impostor phenomenon back in nineteen seventy eight. They were studying high achieving women, accomplished, capable by any objective measure, and they noticed something interesting. These women persistently believed their success wasn't due to their own ability. They attributed it to luck, timing, charm, anything except their own competence. And they lived in quiet terror of being found out. We know now that it affects people of all genders, but research consistently shows that it's disproportionately prevalent amongst women, and particularly women who have navigated spaces that weren't built for them in mind. So what does this tell us? Imposter syndrome isn't a confidence problem. It's not a competence problem, and it's not a you problem. It's a rational response to environments where the rules were never written down for you, where you were often the only one who looked like you or sounded like you, in the room where hard work wasn't always enough because the game just wasn't quite a level playing field. And when you understand that, you can stop trying to think, you need to fix yourself and instead start asking, what do I actually need to move through this? Now, before we go any further, I wanted to address the advice fake it till you make it. Now, personally, I'm not a big fan of this. I get why it exists. It's trying to say to us, act as if. Step up. Stop doubting yourself. And that part I largely agree with. But the words fake it. That's what doesn't sit well with me. Because if I'm faking it, what does that mean? And what does that make me? A con artist? Someone who's pretending to occupy a space where they don't belong. So for me personally, Recently. That advice amplified the feeling that I wasn't meant to be there. It didn't strengthen my resolve. It validated the imposter voice. But what if instead, we reframed it instead of saying, fake it till you make it? We tried something like, I'm learning to navigate this space. I'm growing into, this I'm becoming. I think about the first time you learned to ride a bike. For many of us, we started out with stabilisers. Those cute little training wheels that helped us keep our balance. Those stabilisers didn't mean that we couldn't ride. They meant that we were learning. When the stabilisers came off, we often wobbled. Maybe we even fell. But we got back on and eventually we were flying. Riding like a pro. And for many of us, we may have gone many years without riding. And then one day we get back on a bike. And yes, we probably wobble at first, but in no time we're back in the flow. Nobody called that faking it. We called it learning. The stabilizers in a career transition might be a trusted mentor, a coach or a sponsor. Someone who can see your capability when even you can't see it yet. Their role changes over time and the support you need changes too. But there's no shame in having that support. You're not faking anything. You're navigating a new space. You're learning, growing, and becoming. So why not embrace it? But why do those feelings of imposter syndrome tend to spike so much during periods of transition? William Bridges, a thought leader in transition theory, highlighted that change is the external event. The new role a pivot into a new field while transition is what happens internally. The psychological journey of letting go of who we were living through the uncertainty and slowly growing into who we are becoming. Bridges mapped this journey into three stages. It starts with an ending. When you begin to let go of an old professional identity, maybe the I'm a technical expert or I'm a safe pair of hands. Then you move into the neutral zone where you start shedding your old identity, but the new one isn't yet fully formed. And finally, you move into a new beginning. This is where you start to feel more settled in your new world. I wanted to share a little bit more about each stage and some of the imposter thoughts that may appear. This is based on my own experiences, but also what I've seen with many of my coaching clients. The first stage is the ending, and it's ironic that transitions actually start with an ending, right? Because I bet most of us never think about it that way. But if we really reflect on it, it does make sense. In order to move forward, we need to let go of something old. And that can often be harder than what we think, because this current identity is where we hold our sense of competence. Imposter syndrome at this stage often sounds like if I step away from this, people will finally see that I wasn't that good in the first place. So what happens if we stay longer than what we should? Not because the role still fits, but because this is the last place where we feel unquestionably capable. Stage two The Neutral Zone. This is that in-between stage. I like to think of this as the real messy middle, because you no longer who you were, but you're not yet who you're becoming. You may have already started a new role, or you're stepping up to prove that you deserve to operate at that next level. This is where imposter syndrome is often at its loudest, because the usual evidence of our competence either doesn't exist yet, or it doesn't show up in a way that is familiar to us. And in the absence of this evidence, the voice rushes in. Maybe I'm a fraud. Maybe I can't do this after all. I've noticed two common patterns that often occur at this stage. The first being the over worker. This is the person who doubles down. They over deliver. They never stop. On the outside they look like the superstar. Everyone's thinking, how do you juggle all of it? On the inside, they're terrified of being found out. And eventually, this is the thing that could lead to burnout. The second one is the avoider. This is the person who stays still. They turn down opportunities and they wait until they feel ready. They take one more course, one more qualification, but that feeling of being one hundred percent ready never arrives. Eventually they start feeling stuck and dissatisfied in their role. Both of these are protection strategies. The question is which one is running you? And then the third stage is the new beginning. This is the exciting part and it has a way of sneaking up on you. One day you finish a meeting and suddenly you realize I nailed it. I do know what I'm talking about, after all. You leave feeling energized and accomplished, and you start to gather evidence that you really can do this. You cannot force yourself into this new beginning stage. Impostor feelings don't vanish, but they do start to lose their grip once we start to accumulate real evidence lived experience of actually doing that thing. And that's the bit that starts to take away the power of that voice. Confidence doesn't come from thinking your way into a new identity. It comes from keeping at it long enough for your experience to catch up. And that's not faking it. That's becoming. And this is the cycle. I don't think we ever fully overcome imposter syndrome. We often hear loads of people that we think look highly competent and they say, oh, I have it too. And so the reality is a little bit more new level, new devil every time we move into a new phase. It starts to show up again. But just like riding that bike, once you know what you're dealing with, each time the wobbles become a little less and you get to pro level a little faster. Start to realize that you can move through that discomfort with confidence because you know exactly what's happening. So what do we actually do with this? The three steps are often used with my clients are spot, soften and stretch. First we need to spot that imposter voice. We need to call it out. So the next time you're thinking I'm not ready yet, tell yourself I'm having a thought that I'm not ready yet. And then start to get curious about the emotion underneath. What am I really feeling right now? Is it fear, shame, embarrassment, overwhelm? Ask yourself what is that feeling trying to protect me from? Is it true? Have I felt it before? How did I overcome it last time? What evidence do I have that I can handle this? Then think about what stage of the bridges model you are in right now. Naming your stage is important so that you can understand how that voice comes out. If you're in the neutral zone, of course, that voice is likely to be at its highest because your old identity is gone and the new one is not quite embedded yet. Sometimes just seeing that is enough to take the power away. Next, you need to soften it, soften the grip that it has on you. Ask yourself, what would I say to a good friend that was going through the same situation? I wouldn't say you were fraud. You've made a mistake. You're just not ready. You'd probably say something like, of course it feels uncertain. It's new. You've done hard things before. You've got this. Offer yourself the same compassionate tone. And if evidence helps, write it down. Write down the specific moments that contradict the imposter story. The projects you delivered, the feedback you received, people who sought you out to work with you. Put it somewhere you can see. Read it regularly. Your brain needs the repetition to update that old imposter narrative. And finally, we move into stretch. This is where we actually start to change things up. Because remember, you don't build confidence by waiting to feel ready. You build it by taking action. Action can be small, low stakes steps that move you in the right direction. Think about these as tiny experiments. Instead of one huge high pressure leap run. Lots of small experiments. Maybe it's inquiring about a secondment or doing a job. Shadow facilitating or chairing a meeting. Having one conversation with someone in a field. You're considering writing one social media post that reflects something that you're working on. Each experiment gives you data. What worked, what didn't, what you learned about yourself in the process. Over time, those stretches accumulate into your new identity, and the imposter voice has less and less room to argue with the evidence that you've been generating. And before we close off today, I want to leave you with something to reflect on. Where are you in the previous model right now? Are you in an ending? Still holding on in the neutral zone, waiting to feel ready? Or are you finally catching those first glimpses of a new beginning? Because wherever you are, that's where the imposter voice will be the loudest right at the edge of your next chapter. But now you know what that really means. That voice isn't proof that you're not ready. It's proof that you're growing. The most powerful thing you can do isn't to fight it or to wait for it to disappear. It's to take one small stretch anyway. To act as the person you're becoming and let the evidence build. You're not faking it. You're building it. One brave action at a time. If today's episode resonated, please hit subscribe so you don't miss the next one. And if you have a moment, please leave a review. It helps more women find this conversation when they need it most. And if you're in the middle of a career transition right now and you don't want to navigate it alone, there's a link in the show notes to book a free discovery call. This is courage. Loading. I'm Alicia Noble, and remember, every story of change begins with a single moment of courage. So what's yours going to be?