 Good morning. Good morning, and welcome to EMF camp. My name is Simon. My very small duty here is to very lightly convene this session and what I'm really going to do introduce to do Good morning, I'm here to introduce Jessica. Jessica Rose. Thank you very much. Oh, no, I'm not I'm not. Oh, okay Okay, I've just been given a new job to do apparently we need more volunteers people just like me We need volunteers all day regularly. We need stage and lighting between 7 and 12 video video camera operators We need a lot of that stage lighting seven till 12 youth one till four and four till seven Canteen half past five till eight eight till nine thirty Stewarding it says here if you do any shifts between Midnight and six in the morning you get a double meal token So there is a big list of jobs here that do need to be done So I guess this is probably on the volunteer tense unless you want me to run through all that again. No, let's go on with the talk Jessica. Thank you. Good morning. Is this on? Yeah, that's that's clearly on Good morning, is everybody feel really really good. I love how polite people are they're like, yeah, I slept on the ground It's great So I'm gonna be talking to you all about something that I think is really really interesting and it's just really about cognitive Biases and how they impact our ability to see ourselves To give you a little bit of background about myself quickly My name is Jessica Rose and I work in developer relations and developer relations is this job that probably shouldn't exist It's a little bit too good But I get to travel around and just talk to people about the brilliant stuff They're building and the brilliant stuff. They're doing and just really really brilliant people doing brilliant things and that's interesting But kind of challenging because I'm talking to people a lot smarter than I am about things They're specialists in and that doesn't always leave you feeling especially good about yourself But to back it up a little bit before I got into technology I worked in education So I'm really really interested in brains. I'm really interested in how we learn at If you stop and take just a minute your brain is a wet bag of meat That does everything you care about everything that's beautiful to you everything you're motivated by It's just this weird bag of meat in a bone box Giving you the things you need And at some point we've got to give our brains back something So when I was a teacher I worked in language education in linguistics And there's this concept in linguistics called the zone of proximal development And this is a really great concept. This is all about what your brain needs to learn And the idea of scaffolding in the zone of proximal development is saying if you're working on a language task Or I would argue any task if you're working on something that's too easy for you You don't make any significant learning progress if you're working a job where you already know how to do all the things You can do that job But your brain isn't getting any of the wonderful traction it needs to learn new stuff But on the other hand if you're doing things that are too high above your current level You can't get any learning done and you're not going to really be able to do a good job If you're doing stuff far above your current level you can dip up there very briefly to preview things with enough help But you're not going to get any learning done There's this little tiny sweet spot called the zone of proximal development And that's where your brain wants to be to learn new things Talking to fellow geeks. I always talk about this in RPG terms If you're going around in bopping low-level slimes You're not gonna ever level up And if you're just going directly to the boss You're not going anywhere either. You need to be right there in that place that your brain needs to be to be happy in And this would be fine. This would be amazing But your brain this weird wet bag of meat that gives you everything you care about is Terrible at self-assessment. You have no idea how good you are And actually you really have no idea how bad you are either and At the end of the day, this is about cognitive biases Anybody who's ever lazily put together a paper or I guess a talk Has just copy and pasted the Wikipedia definition for something and here's the Wikipedia for cognitive biases a cognitive biases Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah My husband who actually might be in the audience for a change. Oh, hello Gave me this one which is cognitive biases are your brain taking garbage data coming up with Really crappy conclusions and then becoming absolutely dedicated to those you get bad data in you take a bad conclusion out And you are never letting that go So imposter syndrome who knows what imposter syndrome is Way for those of you who don't know I describe it as the cold sick sad wet feeling That you get when you think oh god, I have no idea what I'm doing and everyone else seems fine I'm gonna get fired And then I'm gonna lose my flat and I'm gonna have to live outside and I live in England So it's gonna rain just that whole process Your your process may vary a bit, but it's the idea that you're just faking it and everybody else is fine But we're rational people so we're gonna go ahead and go to some data. What does imposter syndrome do? I don't think that the scientific community is going to let me define it as This cold sick wet wet sad feeling where eventually you have to live inside outside in the rain Ims and Clants back in the late 70s did a study on high achieving women in imposter syndrome and they found out that They reported feelings of inadequacy Which is kind of in the definitions. So okay The people they found in the study Avoided displaying their target skills if anybody has ever been to a hackathon with me I think this is legit true. This is very true and that feels true forever But they also found that the women in their study used charm and social mitigation So they used soft skills. They were better at humans To get past the fact that they felt bad about this one piece of skill And most importantly and I think most interestingly they reported putting in Longer hours they spent more time and worked harder at the thing they felt incompetent at Okay But who's impacted by imposter syndrome Very very quick very anecdotal sampling anybody who's ever felt like you don't know what you're doing But everyone else did and oh god, they're going to catch me put your hands up Very quickly. Look at who does not have their hands up. Y'all are gonna love this at the end of the talk So Ims and Clants let's come back to them They did the first big study and they found that high achieving women were most often impacted But they kind of went out to study high achieving women So Vera Vasquez and corona went on to say, you know, we think high achieving women of color are most often impacted And then I read a bunch of other studies and didn't want to do a bunch of slides But there are tons of papers and the papers kind of generally say that High achieving minorities people who are underrepresented in their environment most often report feeling imposter syndrome But we just did a quick and dirty sampling here and we had sort of one two pretty much everyone saying uh me So what's with that mismatch what's with us self reporting a really wide variety of people feeling this And the data saying well, you know what it's mostly Mostly the underrepresented mostly women mostly people who are underrepresented in their groups I think there's a couple different reasons for that I think you see women more likely to say I feel Like i'm not ready to do this. I feel like i'm faking it. I feel like an imposter Because it's so much safer for women to say I feel anything In our culture if I say hey, I feel like I don't know what i'm doing and everything's terrible You're like, yeah, everything's terrible And I think for guys, there's this extra pressure to be like no, I don't have feelings. I'm fine. Everything's great Which looks like it sucks a lot And I think representation has a lot to do with it as well So I think if you are a weird blobby orange smiley face And you feel a little bit miserable about things. You're like, I don't know what i'm doing Everything's can I swear everything's a bit shit Go ahead and I look around and I said well I don't feel like I know what i'm doing and everything is a bit shit But when I look around my office or my peer group or the people I really respect A lot of them look like me and they sound like me and they went to the same schools as me Stuff's probably fine. They seem fine. They seem a lot like me wicked If i'm a weird sad capface I know I could have just used the emoji And I have a look around I'm like, ah, I don't know what i'm doing everything's a bit shit And everybody else seems fine But they don't look like me and they don't sound like me And they didn't go to the same schools And oh god, everything is terrible A lot of times you see people report imposter syndrome at different levels based on Their representation within industry because of internalized discrimination So I work in technology, which is great. I strongly recommend it But you do get a lot of messages to people who aren't well represented to say, oh, well This isn't really for you. You don't really belong here. Do you need some help installing ruby onto your computer? I think eventually those messages getting those messages day in day out are something that's really tempting to sort of onboard and internalize Knowledge is doing some really interesting things to imposter syndrome I love technology And social media is really interesting But social media gives us this weird opportunity to compare The whole of our lived lives we're stuck living in our own weird meat bodies We get to deal with all of our own experiences But social media gives us a really unique opportunity to compare all of our lived experiences To a very carefully curated set of how other people live I can see what my co-workers are doing. I can see what my heroes are doing. I can see what my peer group are doing If this talk goes really well I'm gonna brag about it across like four of those If this is terrible and I leave in tears like maybe tumblr Most part when you're looking at like a carefully curated media stream if you're looking at people's social media You're comparing the best of what they're doing To having to live the whole of your life And it feels really unfair and really weird But I think in the abstract I promised how to fix imposter syndrome Which was mostly a lie You can't really debug your brain. Your brain is still going to take garbage data and build terrible conclusions And it's all terrible, but pretty great But all of you are very nice people. Yes It was a long pause and then a weird sound. You're like, oh, well, you know technically. I know you're all very good people This side of the room. I don't trust them at all Being glorious people and that side of the room the first thing you care about Is you want to know how to make it better for other people, right? That side of the room was like, yeah, yeah, I can't say no Get out The most important thing the thing I would tell you before anything else Dear god, this could save your life is do not tell other people they have imposter syndrome I went to a student hackathon last year And I was working on something and swearing quietly and this adorable 18 year old Just like a happy puppy rocked up and was like, it's okay. You just have imposter syndrome And they were really cute. So they're still alive Comes to you and they're telling you something take them at the face value. They could be saying I don't feel like I'm good enough of this There is a whole parade of things they could be saying under that they could be saying I have a gap in my skill set They could be saying I don't fit into the environment. This is not a good culture for me They could be saying maybe I do have imposter syndrome, but don't label that for somebody else Oh My god, if I could make everybody here give positive but meaningful feedback to stuff Who is complained on the internet when a software project or open source project did not work There are a lot of liars in this room Who here has gone out of their way to find somebody who built something they like and say something nice about it You guys are weirdly nice Again, except for that side of the room, which we're like, no This one's not risk-free, but if you feel like you're in a position where you feel fairly safe in your context Model vulnerability say hey Sometimes I have no idea what I'm doing It's a really really great way to say you don't want to tell somebody else you have imposter syndrome But if you tell them, ah, sometimes I have no idea what I'm doing and I cry in the bath It gives them a it gives them a really great opportunity to say oh That's imposter syndrome. That's the idea that people I respect don't always know what they're doing But for this side of the room, that's enough about other people. Let's fix it for you Your brain is terrible at self-assessment assessment can often fix this Take an incredibly valuable industry certification course or do something that actually matters mentor somebody Teach somebody If you're getting the opportunity to share your skill set and get actual feedback on the stuff you've built and the stuff you've done That's going to be incredibly valuable data to combat to combat your meat brain being rubbish I it's a good illustrator. Hey You can't make your brain stop being stupid But you can go ahead and recognize when you get into these loops you say, oh god, I don't know what I'm doing I'm going to get fired Everybody's going to know I'm dumb. I'm going to lose my flat. I'm going to live outside and it rains a lot You could stop here Like that's a really exciting journey to go on But not more than once or twice Once you start going, I don't know what I'm doing. Everything's terrible Recognize look for those feelings and say, ah, let's stop And it's difficult because I got a designer to do my slides and when I was talking through this talk I told my designer what I actually do when I get really stressed out Um If anybody else Eats cake in the bath. Please see me after this because I yes. Yes. I would like to build a case for this not being gross or weird But this is super gross and weird Um When you start to feel that weird breakdown cycle of everything's terrible. I don't know what I'm doing I'm going to get caught. Stop. Just stop take a break walk away from what you're doing You probably cannot take a bath and eat cake at work, but if you can Yeah Um and find something that works for you that just interrupts that cycle Play board games read A lot of people talk a lot of bullshit about how they exercise when they're stressed And I don't believe them But if that's you again come and tell me how you got into that habit because I think that's a little bit better than cake When you start feeling like you don't know what you're doing and everything is overwhelming and everything is terrible Just take a break do something that makes you feel okay But I want to go on a really quick detour I've been talking a lot about imposter syndrome I kind of want to add another cognitive bias to this reframe it a little bit Ims and clans they said You're gonna feel real crappy And that sucks. Are you gonna Avoid displays of your target skills and that sucks But the use of soft skills to get around feeling bad. That's okay And this is gorgeous Has anybody ever used lemon juice as invisible ink? For those of you who haven't you can put lemon juice on a piece of paper It's invisible until you like heat it up hold it to a light Bank robber back in the 90s robbed two banks in broad daylight After having covered his face in lemon juice And he expressed some surprise when being arrested Because how would the cctv have picked him up? And this is difficult because I like to imagine that these two dudes So you or I would like look at this in the newspaper be like, ah stupid people But there were these two researchers Dunning and Kruger who were aware that grant money exists And I like to imagine they were like out on a patio eating breakfast So like grapefruit spoons and all that and be like Dunning Dunning. Yes Kruger. Look at this. Oh, wow lemon juice. Yes quite Because somehow they're British all of a sudden Like and they decided to do a study with some wonderful grant money to see if stupid people know they're stupid So they got about 2,500 people and gave them a general aptitude test like hey here Like if you've ever applied for a really shitty job One of those tests like here are your cognitive skills But They gave these people the test they didn't really care about the scores They cared about their self-assessment versus their scores So when they got the tests back they looked kind of like this But what they did was they gave somebody a test took the test away and then said hey, hey, hey Here's a graph show me on this graph how you think you did relative to your peers You would be shocked and Dunning and Kruger are good dudes. They said the unskilled instead of the stupid They found that the least skilled Artificially inflated their own worth. Well, this was hard for me. So it was hard for everybody because I'm great At the closer you get to being an expert the more likely you are to underestimate your skill set We found that the unskilled because they're much nicer than I am This is always infuriating because I can't see your faces and whenever I talk about this There's somebody in the back going oh, I work with that guy The unskilled are holy and completely Unable to tell that they're unskilled stupid people do not know they're stupid To make it better The unskilled are completely Unable to see skill and other people. They don't know they're stupid and they don't know that you're not stupid It is completely possible for somebody with this uh this condition to fix themselves But they can only do that if they recognize their own lack of skill which coming back to point one They are never gonna goddamn do Which is fine After the waves of rage the idea that stupid people get to go through life really confident and really chuffed about stuff After that passed over me I stopped and had a little bit more of a think you say This idea imposter syndrome this feeling like you don't know what you're doing this feeling like everything's terrible this feeling that you're an idiot Is you getting a really crappy error message from your brain? This is your brain saying hey You're not actually dumb You're aware enough to be looking at your own skills set critically Those dunning cruder lemon juice people that is probably not you This is your brain's best sort of best stab at telling you you don't suck And that sounds kind of miserable, but it is a wet bag of meat. You got to give it some credit So the next time you feel like you have no idea what you're doing and people are gonna catch you and you're gonna get fired Stop stop stop I want you to reframe it It's not that you're a failure It's that you're really getting one over on your brain You're taking this buggy crappy error message and you're seeing it for the value It is if you feel like you're scared and you feel like you don't know what you're doing You're in the zone of proximal development. You're actually learning you're getting things done and you're probably not done in cruder Thank you very much Hello, thank you so much. I really enjoyed that. Um, I feel so confident now Do we have some questions from the audience who would like to who would like to say something here? Who would like I'll bring the microphone over for you a question from the audience Oh come on. Yeah, I have a hand up over here. Thank you Hi, so, um, you mentioned, um various tactics that you can use to, um, stop this cycle happening, um, like, um Distracting yourself, um, going and doing something enjoyable, maybe even exercise if that's someone that does that um And also how the data was showing that people are less likely to show their particular competencies in front of their peers and, um Have you or in fact anyone in the audience got any tips of getting past that stage when You know, you really have got to do the work and you've got to show your competence I think that's so the question is how do you get past that stage where you don't want to show off the skillset you feel bad about you do And that that's really interesting. I'm not good at that yet. Um I've heard people because I give this talk a lot and people give me their um, their ways of addressing it folks have talked about, um Becoming a specialist in a certain subsection of it So that way when there's a question about one specific Area, it's something that your coworkers aren't likely to know So you feel a little bit more comfortable in that space um Yeah, I think just Not working with jerks and putting yourself out there until it feels right Is often helpful. Sorry I feel uniquely unqualified to answer that Okay, do we have another someone else who would like to ask? Yeah, I hope sorry. I spotted over here first. Okay Hello Uh having had to do lots of aptitude tests mayors briggs and all sorts of other things for various jobs I've done. Is there any correlation between imposter syndrome and personality types or particular Outcomes from those type of aptitude tests I The video is running. So I don't want to say I don't really believe in those personality tests I I think that imposter syndrome is something that you see It's really difficult because the studies done on it tend to find people willing to self report So it's really hard to see it tied to larger trends across psychology. So I Grant money is a thing So if you fancy it, I'd be really interested in seeing a study around it, but I haven't seen any research to the effect Sorry Okay, another question here Good morning. Lovely talk. Thank you. Um over here Hi, do you recognize um when you come to do a project or something you've never done before You look at it and you are completely flawed by it You have fear you have scared and you really do get the imposter syndrome Then you start reading up on it and it's still quite scary, but not quite impossible At some point you're actually doing the job and it's okay But then the fourth stage is well anybody can do this this is even worth mentioning because It's trivial and everything seems to go through these four stages I think you've just described my week Oh god, I don't want to do this. Oh, this is gonna go so badly. Oh god. This is terrible. Nobody can do this This is so hard. I'm a moron. Oh, that was actually quite easy. I shouldn't tell anyone Um Yeah, I think that cycles of avoidance tend to sit on top of imposter syndrome and make things worse and worse But there's no really one clear way to say, ah, this is miserable. Just do it Um, I think that like, um the same way Language acts like learning a new language people always have to find the pathways that work the best for them I think finding cope like recognizing the process as you go through it and finding coping mechanisms that really speak to you personally Uh, so I'm a big fan of going to work at home where no one can see me If I think something's gonna be too hard and then coming back a bit cocky two hours later to be like, yeah, it's fine I know I could do that Okay, so yeah, no Sorry, they're there. Um So basically, yeah, we don't want to tell people that they have imposter syndrome because that yeah And we give feedback but if you're managing people then What's the best way of getting them to realize that? Yes, they can do that because that comes up a lot where somebody goes. No, no, no, no, no, no, no That's too much. I cannot do that. I cannot do that. I cannot do that and you're like, dude. No, you can You're good at this and there's only so many times you can say that before they start not believing you Um, so having been a teacher, uh, I really really love managing people. You can tell people what to do. That's quite fun Um So I really draw a lot of management process from having been a teacher Which whenever somebody's like, no, I can't do that. No, that's too hard. Have them talk you through So be like, okay. Well, talk me through how you would address this problem talk me through what you would do And then spotlight where you think the problem's gonna be So I think a lot of times when you get people to articulate First i'm gonna go and research this and then i'm gonna build that and then i'm gonna fix that Once they actually say it out loud once they articulate that they know the steps A lot of times halfway through describing the problem. They'll just be like, oh, no, that's fine. Bye Yeah, so just get people to talk through with you and ask really open-ended guiding questions to say, okay Well, what kind of problems could you see if we did it this way? What do you think about doing it that way? So just kind of give them the opportunity to to explore the problem with you and then send them back Yeah Thank you. Um, I have only one job to do which is to try to keep this to time So i'm actually going to take one more question, uh, which I saw a hand over here. Yes, there we go Hi, um, it's really just a word of caution really. I think it's great. It's great to um, Maybe share with with with colleagues, but I think it's from experience really sometimes you've got to be really careful That colleagues then don't use that against you. So and uh, that's something I've experienced as well So I just had a word of caution about sharing it share it with people you really can trust Yeah, so um I really love when people are able able to model professional vulnerability But do not do this unless you're in a place that has really good support really good culture and you're not working with assholes Yeah, because if you say Hey, I don't feel really confident with this or I need more support with that If you're in a good working space if you're in a good environment if you're working with good people You're gonna get people coming to support you if you're in a crappy environment or a toxic environment Where there's a lot of infighting and you say I don't feel confident around this You'll just get people jumping on you to be like, oh, this person doesn't know what they're doing. You should give me a raise Uh, yeah, I would be careful as well I think just thank you. Thank you very much indeed. I think we better finish right there. Jess. Thank you