I was a student for many years (5 years of undergrad, 2.5 years of grad school), and I became very comfortable with always being able to look at the syllabus and my grade and know what I needed to do and how well I was performing. Work isn’t like that. Like I think is normal, I get a performance review once a year. I find this unsettling, because even though I come in and do decent work, I still often feel like I’m doing something “wrong” and worry that I’m secretly on the cusp of being fired. Folks who have maybe been working for longer than I have, how do you feel and stay confident in your work?
I’ve been a carpenter since I was 18 and a finish carpenter since i was 30. I’ll be 52 this year. So I’ve been doing this for 34 years. By all regards, I’m an expert in my field. My work has been on magazine covers, my work has won awards for architects and designers. I’m known by name by top builders and firms in my area. I now run jobs as a superintendent and/or project manager. I get calls to come work for other companies on the regular.
I still have zero idea why. Like, I just tell people what to do in an order that makes sense. And before that, I beat nails into wood. It wasn’t till about 3 or 4 years ago when my wife took me aside and explained to my face that, yeah, I’m really good at my job that I started to realize that, yeah, I’m pretty good at my job. But everyday, driving in, I’m still just a kid that’s in over his head. I don’t feel confident at work. I know on one level I’m doing OK, I mean I must be, right? But I just come in and do my best and hope it’s good enough. Turns out, that it usualy is good enough.
And I can tell you this. Anyone that walks around super confident in their work, usually sucks at their job. I’ve seen dozens of people claim that they’re the best around, only to get axed or laid off as soon as possible. Don’t bother being confident in your work, be confident that you’re doing the best that you can do and be confident that you have the ability to keep learning.
Impostor syndrome is a thing and it’s common. I’ve been in my industry for 15 years and still lack confidence and feel like everyone else is better than me. The approach that worked for me is to know what I’m aware I do a good job at, and make sure the people who can influence my performance reviews are aware of it. Play to your strengths. In the corporate environment, what matters is what you’re perceived as, not what you actually are. If your performance reviews are good, then you should be fine and know what to keep on doing. If you have a good relationship with your manager, it would also help to ask them directly what things they think you can improve on. Don’t wait for the performance review to tell you that, so you can work on it before it goes on record.
Yeah, impostor syndrome is a good way to describe it, and it does indeed suck. That’s all good advice though, thank you! It is such a strange change of pace to be judged on perception and not purely ability, especially since I feel like I’m not very good at reading other people and knowing how to manage relationships like that. People skills aren’t my forte, hence a career in engineering lol
Fortunately I think my manager does view me well, so I can try to reassure myself with that