Are We Done Asking Women About Imposter Syndrome?
Apparently not. We keep raising imposter syndrome with women, and worse, telling them they ought to have it.

This week, the CNN journalist Christina Macfarlane asked the World Cup rugby star Ilona Maher how she overcomes her imposter syndrome.
If you don’t know Maher, you should. She’s not only a brilliant athlete who helped Team USA win its first Rugby medal in 100 years at last year’s Summer Olympics, she’s also an outspoken feminist who constantly challenges gender and body norms on social media.
Macfarlane’s question seemed painfully out of touch.
Maher, the 28-year old who's no stranger to public jibes and insults, answered assuredly that she doesn’t have imposter syndrome: “I don’t have that. It’s like when you don’t feel like you deserve it? No, I don’t have that.”
CNN’s Macfarlane looked flabbergasted at her response. “How is that possible?” wondered Macfarlane. “I feel like imposter syndrome ruins my life sometimes.”
After elaborating on her successes, Maher really drove the point home: “I feel like people are told sometimes to feel like they have imposter syndrome.”
Well, yes. Indeed.
I’ve long thought about the (bad) advice women are given to succeed at work, and truly I’ve heard it all—from our supposed lack of confidence to our reluctance to “lean in.” From the idea that the gender pay gap could be closed, if we just negotiated better, to the (awful) idea that we’re to blame for our lack of advancement.
But nothing troubles me more than the diagnosis of women’s imposter syndrome—the idea that women don’t belong or don’t deserve to be where we are, that our successes happened in spite of ourselves, or by accident and that some day, people will find that out and it’ll all be over.
I’ve thought about it intellectually and academically and personally too, particularly because it’s precisely when I’ve been most confident in my leadership and advocated for myself, that I’ve received pushback for being “difficult to work with.” I’ve never doubted that I’ve had the experience or the ability to learn when things have become tough at work. But I have, many times over, doubted whether I belong, especially when I’ve been the only–woman of color, immigrant, parent, person with a non-Anglo Saxon name–in the room. And this is precisely why imposter syndrome as an individual diagnosis feels so wrong.
And now, here we are in 2025, with another stark reminder of how we keep raising it and worse, keep pushing it on women as if they ought to have it.
It Won't Go Away
In 2021, I co-wrote an article for the Harvard Business Review with the author Jodi-Ann Burey, entitled “Stop Telling Women They Have Imposter Syndrome.”
Our piece, which went on to become one of HBR’s most popular articles in its 100-year history, argued that this “syndrome”—coined first as “imposter phenomenon” in 1978 by Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes—puts the onus on women to fix systemic issues that prevent us from advancing and belonging. When we’re underpaid, under-promoted, talked over in meetings, that must be our problem to fix; it must be our “imposter syndrome” to cure. And, when through sheer ambition, skill, will power and determination, one of us does make it to the top–like rugby’s Ilona Maher–she must surely be full of doubts, feel like a fraud, constantly question whether she deserves her spot.
In the 50 years since Clance and Imes coined the term, it has gained a life of its own. Today, workshops, self-help books, and affirmations to overcome it abound—almost exclusively focused on women. But now, even the original researchers told The New Yorker that they wish society would stop foisting this phenomenon on women when the problem is so clearly systemic.
If that’s not gender bias in action, I don’t know what is. But what bothers me even more, is how women foist this “syndrome” upon women. As if to say, are you sure you don’t feel it? Are you sure you’re sure?
I’ve been in conferences and meetings too many to count where the women are huddled together in a group discussing their supposed imposter syndrome and encouraging one another to submit even more outrageous examples of it. These are truly the kinds of things I’ve heard at meetings before with incredibly brilliant women…think global leaders:
Lady A (with decades of experience and an objectively qualified leader): “I was leading a meeting last week with the heads of the company and I was so sure they were going to catch me out with a question I didn’t know.”
Lady B (prize-winning scientist): “You think that’s bad? I had to present my research to the president of the European Union and I literally couldn’t sleep all night thinking they’d find out I shouldn’t be leading this!”
Lady C (world leader in the field): “I felt so unqualified to speak at the United Nations last week, I was thinking of calling in sick.”
By engaging in this behavior we’re enforcing the patriarchy and punishing each other. Suddenly it becomes a never-ending race to the bottom over who feels less qualified for their position. And I know firsthand that it’s so much worse for women of color, who are expected to be grateful for crumbs, and quickly penalized if we don’t appear grateful enough.
You know who doesn’t have imposter syndrome? Many incompetent men who become leaders. Those aren’t my words, (though I concur); they’re from Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, a Columbia University psychology professor.
Because if anyone should have imposter syndrome—the feeling that they’re a fraud and don’t belong—it’s them: these guys who recklessly, thoughtlessly change the course of organizations, societies and even a country’s history. We’re clearly not asking them if they’re doubting themselves.
Meanwhile, I’m exhausted that we’re still telling brilliant women they (should) have imposter syndrome. To women, I implore: Push all the way back.
As Maher said, “It's OK to be proud of what you've done. It's OK to believe you deserve something because you've put in the work for it."
She hardly needs me to second her on that point, but that’s OK, I will anyway.