I got the news on a seemingly random Tuesday. Our CEO was stepping down immediately, no notice, no transition timeline—nothing. Twenty minutes later I was on a call with our franchisees to inform them of the change.
Later that night, long after everyone else had gone home, I remember thinking, “I have no idea what I’m doing.”
Sure, I had built companies before. I understood the drug testing business better than many at the company.
But none of that made me feel ready to run the whole damn thing.
For probably six months after that, I doubted almost every call I made. Big ones, small ones, didn’t matter. I’d sit in a meeting and wonder if the regional managers could see straight through me. Eventually I figured out there’s an actual term for this.
Imposter syndrome.
What this feeling actually is
It’s that often not so little voice in your head telling you that you don’t really belong in the room. That you got lucky, or that the timing just worked out, or that any day now someone is going to figure out you’re a complete fraud masquerading as a competent leader.
It’s uncomfortable, sometimes even debilitating—but it doesn’t mean you’re bad at your job.
It usually means you understand your job well enough to know how big it actually is.
Why smart people seem to get hit with it harder
Here’s something odd I’ve noticed running teams for almost two decades now. The guys who never doubt themselves for a second usually aren’t the ones I’d trust with the tough calls. The ones losing sleep over whether they’re good enough? Those are often my best people.
Makes sense if you think about it long enough. Somebody who doesn’t understand how complicated a problem is will walk into it without a second thought. Confidence is easy when you don’t know what you don’t know. But the moment you actually grasp how much can go sideways, that easy confidence disappears. You start seeing the holes in your own plan. You notice what you’re missing.
That’s not a character flaw—it’s someone paying attention.
Why I think imposter syndrome is doing you a favor
Don’t panic if you feel like a fraud sometimes—that discomfort is pulling more weight in your favor than you realize.
For starters, it keeps you careful. When you’re not fully convinced you’ve got it figured out, you check your numbers twice before you send them out. You ask the extra question before signing off on something expensive. I can point to at least three costly mistakes I avoided over the years purely because I wasn’t sure enough of myself to skip the double check.
It also keeps you easier to work for, oddly enough. Nobody sticks around long for a boss who acts like they’ve got every answer. Some of the better leaders I’ve reported to would flat out say “I don’t know, let me find out” in front of the whole room. That did more for their credibility than pretending would have.
And there’s this too. You usually don’t feel like a fraud doing something you’ve already mastered. That feeling shows up when you’re doing something bigger than what you’ve done before, so if it’s talking to you, take that as a sign you’re actually stretching instead of coasting.
How to keep it from taking over
I’m not telling you to just sit with this feeling forever and let it run your life. Left alone too long, it’ll freeze you. You’ll stall out on decisions that needed to get made yesterday. A few things have worked for me on that front.
Look at what you’ve actually achieved, not just what your gut is telling you tonight.
The week I took over as CEO, I felt completely out of my depth, but when I sat down and actually looked at what I’d built up to that point, the record told a different story than my nerves did. Feelings may lie, but your track record doesn’t.
Talk to someone else who’s already been there. Bring this up with almost any entrepreneur you look up to, and don’t be shocked when they say they’ve felt the same exact thing. This isn’t some secret flaw you’re hiding. It’s just part of doing something hard.
When that voice says you’re not ready, never let it talk you out of the opportunity. Instead, let it push you to prepare a little more, but don’t over do it. Do it scared. Some of my biggest wins came from challenges I didn’t feel prepared for.
Where I’ve landed on imposter syndrome
It’s been years since that night in the parking lot, wondering if I was about to run this company into the ground. That voice hasn’t fully gone away. It still shows up when I step out of my comfort zone, but I no longer hear it as a warning. I hear it as evidence that I haven’t gotten too comfortable.
So if you’re facing imposter syndrome, treat it like a sign that you’re smart enough to know how much is still out there to learn.