May 14, 2024 • 35 mins
Welcome to the show, Sara Munro!! Today's episode explores the realm of imposter syndrome and its disproportionate impact on women. Sara candidly shares her journey with imposter syndrome throughout her career. During one memorable incident, a man questioned Sara's choice to jot down "you are enough" in her bullet journal, revealing a lack of understanding regarding women's struggles with self-doubt.
Sara sheds light on the historical backdrop of imposter syndrome. She dives into research showing its varied impact on marginalized groups, who often perceive the systems themselves as flawed rather than just feeling out of place. Sara advocates for the reconstruction of these systems to foster true equity and combat imposter syndrome effectively.
Moreover, Sara shares her encounters with implicit bias and toxic behaviors in certain work environments following verbal missteps. Drawing from her scientific background, she has cultivated resilience and acknowledges that setbacks are a natural aspect of any endeavor. She emphasizes the importance of embracing imperfections and taking risks to overcome the sense of not belonging.
Interested in possibly being a guest on the show? Click the link to get started!
https://forms.gle/V1yGLH9W9Ck2m4TP7
Let's Connect!
Web
Instagram
Facebook
TikTok
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Kristen Daukas (00:04):
Welcome to Conversations on the rocks. The
podcast where the drink isstrong and the stories are
stronger. I'm your host, KristenDaukas. And this isn't your
average chat best. Here realpeople spill the tea alongside
their favorite drinks from thehilarious to the heart wrenching
each episode a wildcard. You'lllaugh, you may cry, but you'll
definitely learn something new.
So grab whatever whet yourwhistle and buckle up, it's time
(00:26):
to dive into the raw, the realand the ridiculously human.
Let's get this chat partystarted. Hey, everyone, it's
Kristen Daukas. And you arelistening to or watching
conversations on the rocks, theshow that is unpredictable as I
am and today you have the joyand pleasure of listening and
(00:50):
learning from Sarah Monroe. Sarais up in the northern New
England area, which as of thisrecording on April 9 just got
pounded with about 18 inches ofsnow while some of us were in 75
degree weather. And I'm sureshe's kind of bitter about that.
But anyways, Sarah hasexperience in many fields, from
(01:10):
fundraising and PR to digitalmedia and even molecular
biology. I'll let her maybe someother time. Talk to us about
that. She's now working withsmall business development and
gender equity organizations. Andhere we go. Cheers, Sarah.
Thanks for being here. Forhaving course, Sara. Sara has an
(01:32):
alcohol free cocktail. In whichif you listened to our friend,
Lisa, Dan forth in a previousepisode who has a alcohol free
business, it's very appropriate.
But oddly enough, we're allconnected. So not too much of a
surprise. So we today are goingto be talking about impostor
(01:59):
syndrome. And impostor syndromeis something that and I'm going
to let Sarah correct me after Isay it is an affliction that is
pretty much only something thatwomen experience. As a matter of
fact, before I even came up tostart recording, I was
mentioning to Steve, and hesaid, I said Do you know what
(02:20):
impostor syndrome is? And he'slike, No. And I said, Well,
that's very fitting that youdon't. And so I kind of went
through and I did the my, one ofmy favorite analogies, which is,
you know, a man and a womanapply for a job and there's 10
qualified, you know, 10requirements on there, a man
will typically look at it andgo, Oh, I've got three of those.
I'm good. Let me send him myresume. Whereas a woman, well,
(02:40):
nine times out of 10 want allnot at least all 10 But maybe
nine before otherwise, they'regonna say, I'm not qualified.
Now. Steve made an interestingcomment. He goes, Well, I never
really thought about it thatway. He said, I guess as men
were just told and had been, youknow, raised that you miss all
the shots you don't take. Sowhat do you got to lose? And I
(03:02):
said, I'm going to use that. I'mgoing to roll that into it. So
we're going to talk about genderand gender inequality. Well, I
guess it kind of is, butimposter imposter syndrome. And
we're going to dig deep. And Ithink in the pre show, we
discover we have so much to talkabout. We're gonna put it into
two parts. So I'm not sure whenwe'll drop the second part. It
might be the next week. I don'tknow. It's always a surprise
(03:24):
around here. So Sarah, I'm goingto turn it over to you.
Sara (03:27):
That's great. Yeah, this is this is a big topic to
discuss. It really is I, whenyou mentioned what Stephen said
to you, I remember it was a fewyears ago, I happened we happen
to be talking about bulletjournals at an event. And there
happened to be gentleman there.
It was a cooking event. And hesaid, Oh, you bullet journal, my
(03:51):
wife is trying to bulletjournal, can you? Can you show
me a few pages. And one pagehappened to be I just taken
notes, I was at a networkingevent, and I was taking notes
from the speaker. And I hadwritten and just I was trying to
keep myself occupied while I wasdoing it. I'd written in big
letters, you are enough? And helooked at it and he said, You
(04:12):
are enough? Do you really needto write that down? Why is that?
And why is that something that aspeaker would say? And he was so
far out of the realm of evenconsidering that someone may
need to remind themselves at atime where they may be feeling
nervous or anxious that they areenough that there's a reason why
(04:36):
they're in that room. Because itnever ever occurred to him. And
I have to say that has beensomething that has come up in my
career over and over again, justwith a lot of women. And I would
also argue with a lot of folkswho have been underrepresented
when it comes to corporateAmerica when it comes to
policymaking decision makingLeadership Teams. There's a lot
(05:00):
of people who areunderrepresented. It's not just
white women, you made
Kristen Daukas (05:05):
an interesting or you kind of corrected me and
are brought to my attention,something I wasn't aware of. And
that was that you made thecomment that women of color,
it's really a white woman,pandemic white woman disease.
Imposter syndrome. Yeah. Talkabout that a little bit.
Sara (05:23):
Yeah, sure. I mean, I'm was in preparing for this show.
I thought, I'm feeling like Ihave impostor syndrome about
talking about impostor syndrome.
Right, oh, this is something weexperience. So I may have may
have taken a deeper dive thanneeded into all of this. But it
was interesting. I was reading aan article from last year in the
(05:46):
New Yorker written by LeslieJamison. So if people want to,
we'll definitely I'll give youthe okay. Yeah, we'll put in the
show notes put in the shownotes. But it referenced some
research from the 1970s. And inthat research, by Pauline
Clancy, I want to give creditwhere credit's due, imposter
(06:07):
syndrome fighting impostorsyndrome warriors, maybe we can
call ourselves that, that whenit comes to people of color, and
perhaps other marginalizedgroups, too, it's it's not that
they don't feel like theydeserve a seat at the table.
It's that they're saying thatthe table is rotten, to begin
(06:28):
with, and needs to be replaced.
And I think that's the placewhere people who have may have
more privileged backgrounds arestarting to come to realize is
that when we have when we reallythink about the biases that
infiltrate everything that we dothe privilege that comes in, if
(06:51):
we really want higher quality,work products, higher quality
leadership, higher qualitypolicy, higher quality
workplaces, and engender a senseof belonging and inclusion, you
need to destroy the old tables.
And with that will come crashingdown imposter syndrome. So
imposter syndrome was actuallyoriginally here's the, the
(07:15):
historical roots of it, it wascalled imposter phenomenon,
where research social scienceresearchers were actually seeing
that these high achievingpeople, typically women were
having these crises of selfconfidence. And over time, it
became called impostor syndrome.
(07:39):
And I would say, probablyaccelerated in the last 10
years, with the rise of all ofthe knowledge that anybody can
put their fingertips on. We allfeel like maybe We're faking it
sometimes. Like, if you aren'tpale and male, and wrote a book,
where do you feel that you havethe qualifications for speaking
(08:01):
up about something?
Kristen Daukas (08:02):
And I think that's a really good point. And,
you know, one of the things thatwe, you know, we want to share a
couple, you know, personalexperiences, is I've been a
digital marketer for over 15years. And back in the day, you
know, then all of a sudden, acouple of years later, it
became, you know, what was theold saying, anybody can hang on,
(08:24):
hang, hang their shingle by thedoor, right? And now, and I
didn't, I agree with you. AndI'm putting the things together
with like, in the past 10 years,the amount of information that
has become available, so anyonetruly can get in, spend some
time on Google. And especiallynow with AI, you turned around,
(08:48):
and you can go in and ask AIgive me you know, a marketing
plan, give me a social mediamarketing plan, give me this
gave me that, and it willconjure it up. And to the point
where even though I've beendoing it for 15 years, all of a
sudden, I'm like questioningmyself and my capabilities.
Whereas, you know, five, sevenyears ago, I wouldn't even think
twice about it. So I was kind ofnot struggling to because I've
(09:11):
had plenty of times where I'vehad impostor syndrome or upon
imposter phenomenon. And butjust as you said that I was
like, oh, yeah, it's like, yeah,so I, you know, somebody could
do all that research, right, andthen turn around and come up
with the same thing that it tookme 15 years of experience to do.
Sara (09:30):
Right. And I would ask, though, is it the same quality?
Absolutely not a Yeah, AI isstill a toddler. It has not
reached any level of maturity,and it's regenerating?
Absolutely in some play. And insome cases, it's regenerating
flawed information to beginwith. And then people are taking
(09:54):
that and then creating the shortform contents and talking as if
they're experts. They just havea better stage presence than
maybe even people who wrote theoriginal pieces on this and they
are taking it as their own or isif they've just discovered No,
like they're Magellan, they'vejust discovered that the
Kristen Daukas (10:16):
and I'm not sure what the opposite of imposter
syndrome is. But I would, here'sthe thing that a lot of us know,
is I don't have to knoweverything. I just need to know
more than you. Yep. Right. Soyou have somebody and especially
with very detailed professions,you're very technical
(10:36):
professions. If you're bringingme in, because I'm the subject
matter expert. You are, Ialready know you don't know
anything, right? It's not likeyou're going to do the work
where it truly comes in as ifwe're going toe to toe with
somebody that's appear in ourindustry. Right. So that's,
that's it's definitely aninteresting phenomenon. I think
(11:01):
it is better to be to call itimposter phenomenon and not
impostor syndrome. Right?
Sara (11:06):
Right. And what contributes to it is the culture
that you're stepping into toeither as an expert or a team
member. I've worked on one team,where if a woman misspoke, I
mean, it's it just astounds methat this has happened in the
last four years. If a women if awoman and the team misspeaks,
(11:30):
just like I just did, the menwould jump all over it and tease
you about it. If a man Missspeaks, it's like, Don't
interrupt me. I mean, it's thatblatantly toxic culture around
that. And I it's astounding thatit can it keeps going. But I
(11:52):
have to say, I love Gen Z. Yeah,impostor syndrome, I think has
really just exploded with Gen Xand millennials, men and women,
I would say and, and non binaryfolks, gender not gender
expansive, folks. I think it'sexploded in the last 20 years
(12:16):
with with our generations, butGen Z just cuts right to it and
says what we've been thinkingall along, and I just love them
for it.
Kristen Daukas (12:24):
And when you when you're talking about that,
are you talking about impostorsyndrome? Are you talking about
the inequality? Well,
Sara (12:30):
inequality is always has I mean, inequality, you can take
back to the dawn of thepatriarchy. Right when, you
know, humanity used to bematriarchal systems. And you and
I live in the United States,even when the early colonists in
the United States, the rememberthe witch hunts, that part of
(12:54):
that was silencing women in waswomen were getting together and
sharing some of the naturalmedicinal practices that they
had learned from some of theindigenous people, but they were
also talking about the men. Andthat was forbidden, you know
that you cannot have these cultsof women getting together. That
is just That's blasphemy. Andit's, it's followed women
(13:19):
through history even. I love youand I both before the show, we
watched RESNA, Reshma Saujani,the founder of Girls Who Code
gave a commencement speech lastyear and recommend everybody
watch that. I'll drop a link.
Yeah, she talked about whenbicycles were first coming to
prevalence in Europe and NorthAmerica, the freedom that it
(13:42):
gave everybody, everybody whowas physically fit enough to
ride a bicycle. And suddenlythough, when you ride a bicycle,
your face gets flushed. Andthere they thought that there
was an there is an epidemic ofill health among women, because
their faces were gettingflushed. Well, really, when you
roll it back to this, thesystems in place, when women
(14:04):
could ride a bicycle and didn'tdepend on the men in her life
for transport, she could go outand meet with other women and do
things like talk about women'srights to vote, right. Awful
things that that were happeningwith women having the freedom to
make their worlds bigger. Andthe reason how they how they
(14:27):
squashed it was to say it's badfor women's health. There was a
time when the early 20thcentury, women shouldn't go to
college because it's bad fortheir health. It's stressful.
Women can't. Women can't endurethe physicality or the mental
strain of going to college. Andthat's why women shouldn't go to
college. Right? Yeah. So
Kristen Daukas (14:51):
we can have an entire conversation on
Sara (14:54):
I know and we can end this we send this to racial
inequality. It goes but it'sreally when we talk about the
systems we feel like we don'tfit in a pasta imposter syndrome
at its core is we don't feellike we fit in, or that we know
enough. Whereas we are in asystem where we don't fit in.
Kristen Daukas (15:13):
Right. So let's talk about that. And we'll we'll
have another conversationanother day about the gender
inequality, because that has itsown, you know, and they do kind
of intertwine. But what I wasgoing to one of the, as you were
talking about Gen Z, because,you know, obviously, I've got
three kids that are Gen Z. Ihave to disagree with you there
because I've watched each of mygirls experience impostor
(15:33):
syndrome. And so it's been, youknow, luckily for me, I knew
what it was, I was able to playdoctor tokus and diagnose, you
know, I saw the symptoms I sawand I was able to diagnose the
malady. And but especially withmy oldest when she went for her
first like real big girl job,right. And, you know, she, in in
(15:55):
some ways, she had a legitimatereason to have impostor
syndrome. But let's stop callingit that. Right. It was a, it was
a new job, a new career forwhich she had plenty of
functioning, ability to do it.
She had, like, you know, shewent from basically bartending
(16:17):
and events management intocatering sales manager, so
dealing with the business sideof it, right, whereas before she
was dealing with the, make surethat set table set up and this
and that, so the physical sideof it, right? So but in her
head, she's like, I've neverdone this before. I'm like, Are
you kidding me? You've beendoing this for the past five
years, it just looks different.
(16:42):
So you know, it was just havingto make her stop and think well,
yeah, you haven't done this job.
However, let's take a look atall the things you've done in
your previous jobs that aregoing to benefit you in in a
desk job. So in you know, Ithink it's just reef for all of
us. It's just reframing it. Whatare some ideas and things that
(17:03):
you can think of what are someif somebody or hopefully lots of
people are listening, but whatare some ways that as humans,
but also as professionalleaders, that we can either get
rid of it, or help alleviate it
Sara (17:28):
was so one part, one of the first steps is to recognize
that everybody has a first day,everybody at one point is new to
what they're doing. Whether youinherit a business, you start a
business, you're going into awell established business,
everybody has a first day, andrecognizing that there needs to
(17:53):
be some structural supports tohelp them through that for, for
instance, your daughter, right.
And on the personal side,remembering you were hired for a
position because of yourexperience, and because of what
you can do. And you just may notknow where, where things are at
the start. But you were therefor a reason. And they picked
(18:17):
you to be there. And so lettingyourself shine, also having
people around you that willwhat's the saying that will
light your candle, not snuff itout, right like that workplace
that I said, if I'm I misspoke,I clearly remember it. I said
eight instead of 10. And boy didthey jumped down my throat
(18:41):
instead of paying attention towhat and I corrected myself.
Immediately when I said eight, Iknew I meant 10. But instead of
focusing on the next sentence,they just couldn't let go of
that. So that building a culturethat is more inclusive that
recognizes that people aren'tgoing to feel like they fit in?
(19:03):
And what are the practices andthe habits that we've had for so
long, that that are really hardto break? That are in some ways,
the implicit bias that we carryabout younger people were people
from different backgrounds orpeople from different countries
or people who have an accent,right? There is a lot of bias
(19:26):
that we carry. And the firststep to that is to recognize
what your bias is and to stopthat.
Unknown (19:40):
Hear what actual AI generated voices are saying
about the Wheeler's Dawnpodcast, it can be amusing it's
better than going to the dentistthe award winning we list on
podcasts can be found just aboutanywhere that you get podcasts
listening to Eugene is betterthan looking at Eugene. Let's
put it this way. The wheelersdot podcast is better than
(20:00):
having your leg broken by a loanshark if AI generated voices are
saying that about the Wheelersdog podcast, shouldn't you be a
listener to?
Kristen Daukas (20:10):
It occurred to me that there are things that we
as individuals personally cando. And I think one of the
biggest things that women andjust say women can do is check
your tribe. You need to surroundyourself by other women that are
(20:30):
cheering you on. And I thinkwhen you have a solid tribe
around you, that's cheering youon that says, You got this. You
go girl, why you aren't you'rethe you know, what if you have
those cheerleaders, right,instead of in, I'm gonna go back
to my oldest, she for a longtime had the little Deb's the
(20:54):
little debutantes around thatall they did was just tear each
other up. And I'm like, white inSam's car nation is going on.
I'm like, we don't do that. Wedid not talk about our sisters
that way. We don't do it wethere are enough people out
there that aren't female thatare doing that that we don't
(21:18):
need. Like if you're if you'resisterhood your sister tribe,
tribe of sisters, whatever, yoursorority whatever you want to
call them. Squad. I liked yoursquad. Yes, not is not lifting
you up. You need a new squad.
Because I think a lot of thatcomes from that like I can't do
this is because you know why?
(21:38):
Somewhere along the way somebodytold you that you couldn't I
don't think any of usintrinsically just wake up and
go, Oh, I can't do this.
Somewhere along the way. We Areyou Are they have been told
you're not good enough to dothis.
Sara (21:54):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And have you seen the dove
commercials that came out aroundthe time of the NCAA basketball
tournaments? Yes. Where thatbrings to light it's really
brought the visuals to youngwomen in athletics about how
they usually what is it by agenine,
Kristen Daukas (22:12):
they've aged out.
Sara (22:13):
I think it's usually like middle school. It's right
around, right around puberty.
Right. When body image, thingsstart to come up. It's the same
with young women in math andscience to I've seen it I felt
it myself is that you have to beperfect, right? And I'm gonna go
back to Reshma Saujani becauseshe wrote a book called Brave,
(22:36):
not perfect. And where she talksabout how we raise boys to be
brave to take risks. And weraise girls to be perfect. Yep.
Right. You cannot send out anemail with a typo in it. So we
would set spend three hoursfinding the last itty bitty typo
and misplace you know, any kindof misplace calm? Does
Kristen Daukas (22:59):
this sound right? And does it? Should I
work my sentences differently?
Exactly.
Sara (23:03):
And here's the thing, there's always going to be a
typo. Absolutely. Even the mostperfect person, there will
always be a typo. If somethingis long enough, there's always
going to be a typo. So just getover it. No one else is spending
that kind of time.
Kristen Daukas (23:18):
And yes, I know there are three different ways
to spell there. But if that allyou took from my correspondence
was the fact that autocorrectdidn't catch they then we've got
bigger
Sara (23:29):
issues, or autocorrect did have you been seeing this with
your predictive text. I waswriting a Word document today.
And it was catching on to what Iwas writing about. And it was
just filling in words. For me.
It's like yep, that's what Iwant to write just tab tab over.
Except that
Kristen Daukas (23:51):
brave over perfect, brave, not perfect,
brave, not perfect. That kind ofgoes back to what Steve said,
when he and I were talking aboutit, which is that he will you
know, as that guys just go, youshoot your shot, right? What's
the worst that can happen? And Ithink that's another dialogue
that women need to, you know, ohmy god, what happens if they say
no? Okay, what if they don't,then you? Okay, but if you don't
(24:17):
try it, guess what, you'redefinitely going to fail.
Exactly. And it's just these arethe kinds of lessons you know
that we need to especially as weas you know, the adult females,
the other big coaching, theyounger ones, but I agree with
you, I don't see it as much withGen Z is you know, I've had a
(24:39):
few interns and employees thatare in that Gen Z and I don't
see it nearly as much with themas I saw it with us. And I was
kind of aged out actually Iwasn't aged out millennials. I
was just parenting, heavy dutyparenting during the millennial
time, but I think there wasthere was a lot more second
guessing there was still a lotof second guessing going on with
(24:59):
them. Millennials with that, butGen Z, I think they're more
like, Alright, so what happensif I mean if I don't make it, I
don't make it big deal is theold you survived 100% of the
worst days of your life so far,
Sara (25:14):
right? And I think that's where a science background has
really helped me in aprofessional science background,
not just not just classroomscience, but actually
Professional Science wherethings fail. things fail
spectacularly. Sometimes,hopefully, you don't have an
explosion, which I have hadones. But things break, things
(25:34):
don't work. I had a boss say,Why isn't this suddenly not
working? And I said, I don'tknow it was raining today.
There's no, there's noconceivable reason why this
didn't work. So we Let's retestit. Try it again. And then
maybe, then let's see if ourhypothesis is wrong, right in
the end, so and
Kristen Daukas (25:55):
so something going along with that something
that you combining this with the10 years, right with the whole
everything over the past 10years. The other thing too, is
any of us whatever we're doingin our work or personal life,
there are so many extenuatingcircumstances that we don't
control that. And just as youwere saying that I had a client
(26:16):
that something we were settingsomething up and something, you
know, on the other side, nothers or not mine, but on the
other on the technical side ofit went belly up. And she was
pretty upset with me. And I'mlike, I can't control that.
Like, I set everything up. I dothe things when I'm going
through and I'm ABX testingeverything, everything is fine.
(26:38):
Once it's done, if somethinghappens to the software company,
you know, ABC. There's nothing Ican do about that. That's not a
me thing. That's a dumb thing.
But it's so easy for everybodyjust to you know, want to look
and point and go oh, no, youtouched it last. I'm like, Well,
no, actually, I kind of do.
Sara (26:58):
ABC. Yeah. And I think that is an artifact of being
consultants too. Right? We'repaying you so much an hour, this
should be perfect. It's like,well, everything has an
imperfect system. Internet's godown global pandemics, people
get sick, child care fallsthrough, people have have to
(27:20):
take care of their mental healthto I see us being much more
humane. Now. Like if someone aslost childcare or they're sick,
it's like, okay, we need torecalibrate the deadline. Figure
out how to get this done before2020. Oh, you have the flu?
Could you if you're sitting upright now, could you at least
(27:44):
proofread this email?
Kristen Daukas (27:46):
But the instance that I just spoke of? Yeah, it
definitely made me questionmyself. 100% I went through
before I came back with aresponse to my client. And I
went through to all the checksand balances. And I'm like,
check, check, check, check,check. But it made me go. Did I
(28:08):
did I did something wrong? Did Imiss a stand? Yeah. You know,
and, you know, I don't getimposter phenomenon very often.
So it's just funny how easy itis to slip into that. Whereas I
can imagine that some body inthe other sex would have been
like, Oh,
Sara (28:27):
right. All right. Yeah, I have dug into someone say this,
this email, that email has to berescinded that you sent to 5000
people because so and so. Okay.
People are saying people arecalling saying that there's a
mistake, and that this isn'tworking. And and so my favorite
line back to that? How manypeople right? You know, as a
(28:48):
consultant, I got to see it.
When was it? It was when SherylSandberg it was before she wrote
lean in. She had talked abouthow corporations and businesses
need to treat contract peoplebetter that were wearing them
(29:08):
out. I mean, it goes way back towhenever that was what early
2000s
Kristen Daukas (29:13):
I think she wrote that book. Um, I think it
was more like around 2010 ish.
Sara (29:18):
It was henna. Yeah. It was quite, quite, that's okay. Yeah,
yeah. But she was saying that weare developing a gig economy and
that consultants and freelancersare going to be used more and
more, and we need to treat thembetter that no, it is a system
problem. And how many of us nowright into our client contracts
(29:42):
that certain things are beyondour control? Right?
Kristen Daukas (29:46):
I learned that lesson several years ago. It's
like yeah, it is not my fault ifmeta goes down. I'm sorry if
Facebook is down yes, it's ait's a trending hashtag on
Twitter or x. But it's not my Ican do nothing about it.
Sara (30:02):
And I defend a designer who comes back and says You made
another change, you have toapprove this proof I, I'm the
same with our printers. I've hadto eat a printing bill with a
client. Because there was a typoin it. It was, it was, it was
like a significant piece thatneeded to be fixed. We had to
rip a page out of a program andput it back in for an event. We
(30:24):
had the time to do it. But Ihadn't written in my contract.
final proof approval means finalproof approval. I am not the
final proof approval. So Ilearned that lesson pretty hard.
Yeah. So
Kristen Daukas (30:39):
the ones with the ones that take money out of
our pocket book are always theones that we go, okay, next
rendition while you're up andgo, okay. Oh, my light just went
off. And now it's, I'm likelooking. If y'all can't see me,
I'm like looking. Oh, Rudy.
Sara (30:56):
I know where we're at. You talked about the 18 inches of
snow. Well, the benefit that wehad was 50 degrees over the
weekend and a total eclipse wewere in the path of totality. So
the snow last week was okay,that fluky internet when we talk
about things going wrong. Like,yeah, I have to say, I can do
(31:18):
these live shows, as long as theinternet is stable. And during
those snowstorms, internet wasnot stable. So it's just like,
yes, those emails were all in myoutbox. None of them went
because internet went out. Oh,well.
Kristen Daukas (31:34):
And did you witness a rapture? I'm sorry,
joking. Johnny raptures.
Unknown (31:43):
Have we survived at this point.
Kristen Daukas (31:45):
I don't. I was talking about this to my my
trainer today. It was like, youknow, I remember the 2017. We
were totality here. I don'tremember anybody talking about a
rapture. I'm like, this world isstart. I'm starting to feel old
because I'm starting to say,What is wrong with this world?
Sara (32:05):
Well, look at it this way.
We survived y2k. Yeah, wesurvived. Wasn't there a rapture
in like 2006 2000? Net? Well, wesurvived the crashes of those
times, right? We're Gen X. Sowe've just we've survived how
many recessions? Oh, yeah,right, honestly.
Kristen Daukas (32:21):
Yeah, that's why we're the fafo. Generation.
Okay, we are going to wrap thisup a little bit. And then we are
going to Sarah is going to comeback and we're going to go into
more of a instead of just, thisis kind of like, um, this was
impostor syndrome. 101. Right.
But what I want us to talk aboutwhen we get together, again, is
a little bit more about whatbusinesses and people that
(32:43):
aren't impacted. Let me say itthat way, people that are not
impacted by impostor syndrome,what can what can what can we
do? How can we support? How canwe get rid of it? How can we
support these women? And I alsowant to talk a little bit then
too, about just kind ofcontinuing to up end this system
(33:04):
that no longer serves any of uswell, even the ones that it
supposedly serves, I don't thinkit serves them very well,
because they're having to live alittle bit of this life. So in
closing, what would you like?
What any closing comments beforewe sign off on this
Sara (33:24):
closing comments, I would say, I will take a page from
Brave not perfect, and to saythat everybody deserves the
opportunity to take a risk andto embrace some imperfections.
And that is part of life. Right?
And, and I can say that from aprivileged, privileged position.
(33:46):
And also recognize that thereare inequities that I faced too,
and that it's okay to stand inyour own space, as our friend
Lisa says, stand in yourbrilliance. Right, right, and
lift each other
Kristen Daukas (34:05):
up. And that, my friends, is something you will
hear me talk about all the time.
Going back to what I saidearlier, it's like, you know,
make sure you've got a goodsquad around you that surrounds
you. And if you don't find a newsquad, because they're not for
you, and when you do need them,they're not going to be there,
at least not to help you.
They'll be there to watch youfall. But that's about it. So
(34:28):
till next time, my friends,thank you for tuning in and I
will catch you on the flip side.
As the saying goes, you don'thave to go home but you can't
stay here and that's a wrap forthis week's episode. A big
thanks to my guests for sharingtheir story and to you for
listening. Don't forget to sharethe show with your friends and
(34:48):
spread the words and if you'dlike to be a guest on the show,
the link is in the show notestill next time cheers
Welcome to Conversations on the rocks. The
podcast where the drink isstrong and the stories are
stronger. I'm your host, KristenDaukas. And this isn't your
average chat best. Here realpeople spill the tea alongside
their favorite drinks from thehilarious to the heart wrenching
each episode a wildcard. You'lllaugh, you may cry, but you'll
definitely learn something new.
So grab whatever whet yourwhistle and buckle up, it's time
(00:26):
to dive into the raw, the realand the ridiculously human.
Let's get this chat partystarted. Hey, everyone, it's
Kristen Daukas. And you arelistening to or watching
conversations on the rocks, theshow that is unpredictable as I
am and today you have the joyand pleasure of listening and
(00:50):
learning from Sarah Monroe. Sarais up in the northern New
England area, which as of thisrecording on April 9 just got
pounded with about 18 inches ofsnow while some of us were in 75
degree weather. And I'm sureshe's kind of bitter about that.
But anyways, Sarah hasexperience in many fields, from
(01:10):
fundraising and PR to digitalmedia and even molecular
biology. I'll let her maybe someother time. Talk to us about
that. She's now working withsmall business development and
gender equity organizations. Andhere we go. Cheers, Sarah.
Thanks for being here. Forhaving course, Sara. Sara has an
(01:32):
alcohol free cocktail. In whichif you listened to our friend,
Lisa, Dan forth in a previousepisode who has a alcohol free
business, it's very appropriate.
But oddly enough, we're allconnected. So not too much of a
surprise. So we today are goingto be talking about impostor
(01:59):
syndrome. And impostor syndromeis something that and I'm going
to let Sarah correct me after Isay it is an affliction that is
pretty much only something thatwomen experience. As a matter of
fact, before I even came up tostart recording, I was
mentioning to Steve, and hesaid, I said Do you know what
(02:20):
impostor syndrome is? And he'slike, No. And I said, Well,
that's very fitting that youdon't. And so I kind of went
through and I did the my, one ofmy favorite analogies, which is,
you know, a man and a womanapply for a job and there's 10
qualified, you know, 10requirements on there, a man
will typically look at it andgo, Oh, I've got three of those.
I'm good. Let me send him myresume. Whereas a woman, well,
(02:40):
nine times out of 10 want allnot at least all 10 But maybe
nine before otherwise, they'regonna say, I'm not qualified.
Now. Steve made an interestingcomment. He goes, Well, I never
really thought about it thatway. He said, I guess as men
were just told and had been, youknow, raised that you miss all
the shots you don't take. Sowhat do you got to lose? And I
(03:02):
said, I'm going to use that. I'mgoing to roll that into it. So
we're going to talk about genderand gender inequality. Well, I
guess it kind of is, butimposter imposter syndrome. And
we're going to dig deep. And Ithink in the pre show, we
discover we have so much to talkabout. We're gonna put it into
two parts. So I'm not sure whenwe'll drop the second part. It
might be the next week. I don'tknow. It's always a surprise
(03:24):
around here. So Sarah, I'm goingto turn it over to you.
Sara (03:27):
That's great. Yeah, this is this is a big topic to
discuss. It really is I, whenyou mentioned what Stephen said
to you, I remember it was a fewyears ago, I happened we happen
to be talking about bulletjournals at an event. And there
happened to be gentleman there.
It was a cooking event. And hesaid, Oh, you bullet journal, my
(03:51):
wife is trying to bulletjournal, can you? Can you show
me a few pages. And one pagehappened to be I just taken
notes, I was at a networkingevent, and I was taking notes
from the speaker. And I hadwritten and just I was trying to
keep myself occupied while I wasdoing it. I'd written in big
letters, you are enough? And helooked at it and he said, You
(04:12):
are enough? Do you really needto write that down? Why is that?
And why is that something that aspeaker would say? And he was so
far out of the realm of evenconsidering that someone may
need to remind themselves at atime where they may be feeling
nervous or anxious that they areenough that there's a reason why
(04:36):
they're in that room. Because itnever ever occurred to him. And
I have to say that has beensomething that has come up in my
career over and over again, justwith a lot of women. And I would
also argue with a lot of folkswho have been underrepresented
when it comes to corporateAmerica when it comes to
policymaking decision makingLeadership Teams. There's a lot
(05:00):
of people who areunderrepresented. It's not just
white women, you made
Kristen Daukas (05:05):
an interesting or you kind of corrected me and
are brought to my attention,something I wasn't aware of. And
that was that you made thecomment that women of color,
it's really a white woman,pandemic white woman disease.
Imposter syndrome. Yeah. Talkabout that a little bit.
Sara (05:23):
Yeah, sure. I mean, I'm was in preparing for this show.
I thought, I'm feeling like Ihave impostor syndrome about
talking about impostor syndrome.
Right, oh, this is something weexperience. So I may have may
have taken a deeper dive thanneeded into all of this. But it
was interesting. I was reading aan article from last year in the
(05:46):
New Yorker written by LeslieJamison. So if people want to,
we'll definitely I'll give youthe okay. Yeah, we'll put in the
show notes put in the shownotes. But it referenced some
research from the 1970s. And inthat research, by Pauline
Clancy, I want to give creditwhere credit's due, imposter
(06:07):
syndrome fighting impostorsyndrome warriors, maybe we can
call ourselves that, that whenit comes to people of color, and
perhaps other marginalizedgroups, too, it's it's not that
they don't feel like theydeserve a seat at the table.
It's that they're saying thatthe table is rotten, to begin
(06:28):
with, and needs to be replaced.
And I think that's the placewhere people who have may have
more privileged backgrounds arestarting to come to realize is
that when we have when we reallythink about the biases that
infiltrate everything that we dothe privilege that comes in, if
(06:51):
we really want higher quality,work products, higher quality
leadership, higher qualitypolicy, higher quality
workplaces, and engender a senseof belonging and inclusion, you
need to destroy the old tables.
And with that will come crashingdown imposter syndrome. So
imposter syndrome was actuallyoriginally here's the, the
(07:15):
historical roots of it, it wascalled imposter phenomenon,
where research social scienceresearchers were actually seeing
that these high achievingpeople, typically women were
having these crises of selfconfidence. And over time, it
became called impostor syndrome.
(07:39):
And I would say, probablyaccelerated in the last 10
years, with the rise of all ofthe knowledge that anybody can
put their fingertips on. We allfeel like maybe We're faking it
sometimes. Like, if you aren'tpale and male, and wrote a book,
where do you feel that you havethe qualifications for speaking
(08:01):
up about something?
Kristen Daukas (08:02):
And I think that's a really good point. And,
you know, one of the things thatwe, you know, we want to share a
couple, you know, personalexperiences, is I've been a
digital marketer for over 15years. And back in the day, you
know, then all of a sudden, acouple of years later, it
became, you know, what was theold saying, anybody can hang on,
(08:24):
hang, hang their shingle by thedoor, right? And now, and I
didn't, I agree with you. AndI'm putting the things together
with like, in the past 10 years,the amount of information that
has become available, so anyonetruly can get in, spend some
time on Google. And especiallynow with AI, you turned around,
(08:48):
and you can go in and ask AIgive me you know, a marketing
plan, give me a social mediamarketing plan, give me this
gave me that, and it willconjure it up. And to the point
where even though I've beendoing it for 15 years, all of a
sudden, I'm like questioningmyself and my capabilities.
Whereas, you know, five, sevenyears ago, I wouldn't even think
twice about it. So I was kind ofnot struggling to because I've
(09:11):
had plenty of times where I'vehad impostor syndrome or upon
imposter phenomenon. And butjust as you said that I was
like, oh, yeah, it's like, yeah,so I, you know, somebody could
do all that research, right, andthen turn around and come up
with the same thing that it tookme 15 years of experience to do.
Sara (09:30):
Right. And I would ask, though, is it the same quality?
Absolutely not a Yeah, AI isstill a toddler. It has not
reached any level of maturity,and it's regenerating?
Absolutely in some play. And insome cases, it's regenerating
flawed information to beginwith. And then people are taking
(09:54):
that and then creating the shortform contents and talking as if
they're experts. They just havea better stage presence than
maybe even people who wrote theoriginal pieces on this and they
are taking it as their own or isif they've just discovered No,
like they're Magellan, they'vejust discovered that the
Kristen Daukas (10:16):
and I'm not sure what the opposite of imposter
syndrome is. But I would, here'sthe thing that a lot of us know,
is I don't have to knoweverything. I just need to know
more than you. Yep. Right. Soyou have somebody and especially
with very detailed professions,you're very technical
(10:36):
professions. If you're bringingme in, because I'm the subject
matter expert. You are, Ialready know you don't know
anything, right? It's not likeyou're going to do the work
where it truly comes in as ifwe're going toe to toe with
somebody that's appear in ourindustry. Right. So that's,
that's it's definitely aninteresting phenomenon. I think
(11:01):
it is better to be to call itimposter phenomenon and not
impostor syndrome. Right?
Sara (11:06):
Right. And what contributes to it is the culture
that you're stepping into toeither as an expert or a team
member. I've worked on one team,where if a woman misspoke, I
mean, it's it just astounds methat this has happened in the
last four years. If a women if awoman and the team misspeaks,
(11:30):
just like I just did, the menwould jump all over it and tease
you about it. If a man Missspeaks, it's like, Don't
interrupt me. I mean, it's thatblatantly toxic culture around
that. And I it's astounding thatit can it keeps going. But I
(11:52):
have to say, I love Gen Z. Yeah,impostor syndrome, I think has
really just exploded with Gen Xand millennials, men and women,
I would say and, and non binaryfolks, gender not gender
expansive, folks. I think it'sexploded in the last 20 years
(12:16):
with with our generations, butGen Z just cuts right to it and
says what we've been thinkingall along, and I just love them
for it.
Kristen Daukas (12:24):
And when you when you're talking about that,
are you talking about impostorsyndrome? Are you talking about
the inequality? Well,
Sara (12:30):
inequality is always has I mean, inequality, you can take
back to the dawn of thepatriarchy. Right when, you
know, humanity used to bematriarchal systems. And you and
I live in the United States,even when the early colonists in
the United States, the rememberthe witch hunts, that part of
(12:54):
that was silencing women in waswomen were getting together and
sharing some of the naturalmedicinal practices that they
had learned from some of theindigenous people, but they were
also talking about the men. Andthat was forbidden, you know
that you cannot have these cultsof women getting together. That
is just That's blasphemy. Andit's, it's followed women
(13:19):
through history even. I love youand I both before the show, we
watched RESNA, Reshma Saujani,the founder of Girls Who Code
gave a commencement speech lastyear and recommend everybody
watch that. I'll drop a link.
Yeah, she talked about whenbicycles were first coming to
prevalence in Europe and NorthAmerica, the freedom that it
(13:42):
gave everybody, everybody whowas physically fit enough to
ride a bicycle. And suddenlythough, when you ride a bicycle,
your face gets flushed. Andthere they thought that there
was an there is an epidemic ofill health among women, because
their faces were gettingflushed. Well, really, when you
roll it back to this, thesystems in place, when women
(14:04):
could ride a bicycle and didn'tdepend on the men in her life
for transport, she could go outand meet with other women and do
things like talk about women'srights to vote, right. Awful
things that that were happeningwith women having the freedom to
make their worlds bigger. Andthe reason how they how they
(14:27):
squashed it was to say it's badfor women's health. There was a
time when the early 20thcentury, women shouldn't go to
college because it's bad fortheir health. It's stressful.
Women can't. Women can't endurethe physicality or the mental
strain of going to college. Andthat's why women shouldn't go to
college. Right? Yeah. So
Kristen Daukas (14:51):
we can have an entire conversation on
Sara (14:54):
I know and we can end this we send this to racial
inequality. It goes but it'sreally when we talk about the
systems we feel like we don'tfit in a pasta imposter syndrome
at its core is we don't feellike we fit in, or that we know
enough. Whereas we are in asystem where we don't fit in.
Kristen Daukas (15:13):
Right. So let's talk about that. And we'll we'll
have another conversationanother day about the gender
inequality, because that has itsown, you know, and they do kind
of intertwine. But what I wasgoing to one of the, as you were
talking about Gen Z, because,you know, obviously, I've got
three kids that are Gen Z. Ihave to disagree with you there
because I've watched each of mygirls experience impostor
(15:33):
syndrome. And so it's been, youknow, luckily for me, I knew
what it was, I was able to playdoctor tokus and diagnose, you
know, I saw the symptoms I sawand I was able to diagnose the
malady. And but especially withmy oldest when she went for her
first like real big girl job,right. And, you know, she, in in
(15:55):
some ways, she had a legitimatereason to have impostor
syndrome. But let's stop callingit that. Right. It was a, it was
a new job, a new career forwhich she had plenty of
functioning, ability to do it.
She had, like, you know, shewent from basically bartending
(16:17):
and events management intocatering sales manager, so
dealing with the business sideof it, right, whereas before she
was dealing with the, make surethat set table set up and this
and that, so the physical sideof it, right? So but in her
head, she's like, I've neverdone this before. I'm like, Are
you kidding me? You've beendoing this for the past five
years, it just looks different.
(16:42):
So you know, it was just havingto make her stop and think well,
yeah, you haven't done this job.
However, let's take a look atall the things you've done in
your previous jobs that aregoing to benefit you in in a
desk job. So in you know, Ithink it's just reef for all of
us. It's just reframing it. Whatare some ideas and things that
(17:03):
you can think of what are someif somebody or hopefully lots of
people are listening, but whatare some ways that as humans,
but also as professionalleaders, that we can either get
rid of it, or help alleviate it
Sara (17:28):
was so one part, one of the first steps is to recognize
that everybody has a first day,everybody at one point is new to
what they're doing. Whether youinherit a business, you start a
business, you're going into awell established business,
everybody has a first day, andrecognizing that there needs to
(17:53):
be some structural supports tohelp them through that for, for
instance, your daughter, right.
And on the personal side,remembering you were hired for a
position because of yourexperience, and because of what
you can do. And you just may notknow where, where things are at
the start. But you were therefor a reason. And they picked
(18:17):
you to be there. And so lettingyourself shine, also having
people around you that willwhat's the saying that will
light your candle, not snuff itout, right like that workplace
that I said, if I'm I misspoke,I clearly remember it. I said
eight instead of 10. And boy didthey jumped down my throat
(18:41):
instead of paying attention towhat and I corrected myself.
Immediately when I said eight, Iknew I meant 10. But instead of
focusing on the next sentence,they just couldn't let go of
that. So that building a culturethat is more inclusive that
recognizes that people aren'tgoing to feel like they fit in?
(19:03):
And what are the practices andthe habits that we've had for so
long, that that are really hardto break? That are in some ways,
the implicit bias that we carryabout younger people were people
from different backgrounds orpeople from different countries
or people who have an accent,right? There is a lot of bias
(19:26):
that we carry. And the firststep to that is to recognize
what your bias is and to stopthat.
Unknown (19:40):
Hear what actual AI generated voices are saying
about the Wheeler's Dawnpodcast, it can be amusing it's
better than going to the dentistthe award winning we list on
podcasts can be found just aboutanywhere that you get podcasts
listening to Eugene is betterthan looking at Eugene. Let's
put it this way. The wheelersdot podcast is better than
(20:00):
having your leg broken by a loanshark if AI generated voices are
saying that about the Wheelersdog podcast, shouldn't you be a
listener to?
Kristen Daukas (20:10):
It occurred to me that there are things that we
as individuals personally cando. And I think one of the
biggest things that women andjust say women can do is check
your tribe. You need to surroundyourself by other women that are
(20:30):
cheering you on. And I thinkwhen you have a solid tribe
around you, that's cheering youon that says, You got this. You
go girl, why you aren't you'rethe you know, what if you have
those cheerleaders, right,instead of in, I'm gonna go back
to my oldest, she for a longtime had the little Deb's the
(20:54):
little debutantes around thatall they did was just tear each
other up. And I'm like, white inSam's car nation is going on.
I'm like, we don't do that. Wedid not talk about our sisters
that way. We don't do it wethere are enough people out
there that aren't female thatare doing that that we don't
(21:18):
need. Like if you're if you'resisterhood your sister tribe,
tribe of sisters, whatever, yoursorority whatever you want to
call them. Squad. I liked yoursquad. Yes, not is not lifting
you up. You need a new squad.
Because I think a lot of thatcomes from that like I can't do
this is because you know why?
(21:38):
Somewhere along the way somebodytold you that you couldn't I
don't think any of usintrinsically just wake up and
go, Oh, I can't do this.
Somewhere along the way. We Areyou Are they have been told
you're not good enough to dothis.
Sara (21:54):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And have you seen the dove
commercials that came out aroundthe time of the NCAA basketball
tournaments? Yes. Where thatbrings to light it's really
brought the visuals to youngwomen in athletics about how
they usually what is it by agenine,
Kristen Daukas (22:12):
they've aged out.
Sara (22:13):
I think it's usually like middle school. It's right
around, right around puberty.
Right. When body image, thingsstart to come up. It's the same
with young women in math andscience to I've seen it I felt
it myself is that you have to beperfect, right? And I'm gonna go
back to Reshma Saujani becauseshe wrote a book called Brave,
(22:36):
not perfect. And where she talksabout how we raise boys to be
brave to take risks. And weraise girls to be perfect. Yep.
Right. You cannot send out anemail with a typo in it. So we
would set spend three hoursfinding the last itty bitty typo
and misplace you know, any kindof misplace calm? Does
Kristen Daukas (22:59):
this sound right? And does it? Should I
work my sentences differently?
Exactly.
Sara (23:03):
And here's the thing, there's always going to be a
typo. Absolutely. Even the mostperfect person, there will
always be a typo. If somethingis long enough, there's always
going to be a typo. So just getover it. No one else is spending
that kind of time.
Kristen Daukas (23:18):
And yes, I know there are three different ways
to spell there. But if that allyou took from my correspondence
was the fact that autocorrectdidn't catch they then we've got
bigger
Sara (23:29):
issues, or autocorrect did have you been seeing this with
your predictive text. I waswriting a Word document today.
And it was catching on to what Iwas writing about. And it was
just filling in words. For me.
It's like yep, that's what Iwant to write just tab tab over.
Except that
Kristen Daukas (23:51):
brave over perfect, brave, not perfect,
brave, not perfect. That kind ofgoes back to what Steve said,
when he and I were talking aboutit, which is that he will you
know, as that guys just go, youshoot your shot, right? What's
the worst that can happen? And Ithink that's another dialogue
that women need to, you know, ohmy god, what happens if they say
no? Okay, what if they don't,then you? Okay, but if you don't
(24:17):
try it, guess what, you'redefinitely going to fail.
Exactly. And it's just these arethe kinds of lessons you know
that we need to especially as weas you know, the adult females,
the other big coaching, theyounger ones, but I agree with
you, I don't see it as much withGen Z is you know, I've had a
(24:39):
few interns and employees thatare in that Gen Z and I don't
see it nearly as much with themas I saw it with us. And I was
kind of aged out actually Iwasn't aged out millennials. I
was just parenting, heavy dutyparenting during the millennial
time, but I think there wasthere was a lot more second
guessing there was still a lotof second guessing going on with
(24:59):
them. Millennials with that, butGen Z, I think they're more
like, Alright, so what happensif I mean if I don't make it, I
don't make it big deal is theold you survived 100% of the
worst days of your life so far,
Sara (25:14):
right? And I think that's where a science background has
really helped me in aprofessional science background,
not just not just classroomscience, but actually
Professional Science wherethings fail. things fail
spectacularly. Sometimes,hopefully, you don't have an
explosion, which I have hadones. But things break, things
(25:34):
don't work. I had a boss say,Why isn't this suddenly not
working? And I said, I don'tknow it was raining today.
There's no, there's noconceivable reason why this
didn't work. So we Let's retestit. Try it again. And then
maybe, then let's see if ourhypothesis is wrong, right in
the end, so and
Kristen Daukas (25:55):
so something going along with that something
that you combining this with the10 years, right with the whole
everything over the past 10years. The other thing too, is
any of us whatever we're doingin our work or personal life,
there are so many extenuatingcircumstances that we don't
control that. And just as youwere saying that I had a client
(26:16):
that something we were settingsomething up and something, you
know, on the other side, nothers or not mine, but on the
other on the technical side ofit went belly up. And she was
pretty upset with me. And I'mlike, I can't control that.
Like, I set everything up. I dothe things when I'm going
through and I'm ABX testingeverything, everything is fine.
(26:38):
Once it's done, if somethinghappens to the software company,
you know, ABC. There's nothing Ican do about that. That's not a
me thing. That's a dumb thing.
But it's so easy for everybodyjust to you know, want to look
and point and go oh, no, youtouched it last. I'm like, Well,
no, actually, I kind of do.
Sara (26:58):
ABC. Yeah. And I think that is an artifact of being
consultants too. Right? We'repaying you so much an hour, this
should be perfect. It's like,well, everything has an
imperfect system. Internet's godown global pandemics, people
get sick, child care fallsthrough, people have have to
(27:20):
take care of their mental healthto I see us being much more
humane. Now. Like if someone aslost childcare or they're sick,
it's like, okay, we need torecalibrate the deadline. Figure
out how to get this done before2020. Oh, you have the flu?
Could you if you're sitting upright now, could you at least
(27:44):
proofread this email?
Kristen Daukas (27:46):
But the instance that I just spoke of? Yeah, it
definitely made me questionmyself. 100% I went through
before I came back with aresponse to my client. And I
went through to all the checksand balances. And I'm like,
check, check, check, check,check. But it made me go. Did I
(28:08):
did I did something wrong? Did Imiss a stand? Yeah. You know,
and, you know, I don't getimposter phenomenon very often.
So it's just funny how easy itis to slip into that. Whereas I
can imagine that some body inthe other sex would have been
like, Oh,
Sara (28:27):
right. All right. Yeah, I have dug into someone say this,
this email, that email has to berescinded that you sent to 5000
people because so and so. Okay.
People are saying people arecalling saying that there's a
mistake, and that this isn'tworking. And and so my favorite
line back to that? How manypeople right? You know, as a
(28:48):
consultant, I got to see it.
When was it? It was when SherylSandberg it was before she wrote
lean in. She had talked abouthow corporations and businesses
need to treat contract peoplebetter that were wearing them
(29:08):
out. I mean, it goes way back towhenever that was what early
2000s
Kristen Daukas (29:13):
I think she wrote that book. Um, I think it
was more like around 2010 ish.
Sara (29:18):
It was henna. Yeah. It was quite, quite, that's okay. Yeah,
yeah. But she was saying that weare developing a gig economy and
that consultants and freelancersare going to be used more and
more, and we need to treat thembetter that no, it is a system
problem. And how many of us nowright into our client contracts
(29:42):
that certain things are beyondour control? Right?
Kristen Daukas (29:46):
I learned that lesson several years ago. It's
like yeah, it is not my fault ifmeta goes down. I'm sorry if
Facebook is down yes, it's ait's a trending hashtag on
Twitter or x. But it's not my Ican do nothing about it.
Sara (30:02):
And I defend a designer who comes back and says You made
another change, you have toapprove this proof I, I'm the
same with our printers. I've hadto eat a printing bill with a
client. Because there was a typoin it. It was, it was, it was
like a significant piece thatneeded to be fixed. We had to
rip a page out of a program andput it back in for an event. We
(30:24):
had the time to do it. But Ihadn't written in my contract.
final proof approval means finalproof approval. I am not the
final proof approval. So Ilearned that lesson pretty hard.
Yeah. So
Kristen Daukas (30:39):
the ones with the ones that take money out of
our pocket book are always theones that we go, okay, next
rendition while you're up andgo, okay. Oh, my light just went
off. And now it's, I'm likelooking. If y'all can't see me,
I'm like looking. Oh, Rudy.
Sara (30:56):
I know where we're at. You talked about the 18 inches of
snow. Well, the benefit that wehad was 50 degrees over the
weekend and a total eclipse wewere in the path of totality. So
the snow last week was okay,that fluky internet when we talk
about things going wrong. Like,yeah, I have to say, I can do
(31:18):
these live shows, as long as theinternet is stable. And during
those snowstorms, internet wasnot stable. So it's just like,
yes, those emails were all in myoutbox. None of them went
because internet went out. Oh,well.
Kristen Daukas (31:34):
And did you witness a rapture? I'm sorry,
joking. Johnny raptures.
Unknown (31:43):
Have we survived at this point.
Kristen Daukas (31:45):
I don't. I was talking about this to my my
trainer today. It was like, youknow, I remember the 2017. We
were totality here. I don'tremember anybody talking about a
rapture. I'm like, this world isstart. I'm starting to feel old
because I'm starting to say,What is wrong with this world?
Sara (32:05):
Well, look at it this way.
We survived y2k. Yeah, wesurvived. Wasn't there a rapture
in like 2006 2000? Net? Well, wesurvived the crashes of those
times, right? We're Gen X. Sowe've just we've survived how
many recessions? Oh, yeah,right, honestly.
Kristen Daukas (32:21):
Yeah, that's why we're the fafo. Generation.
Okay, we are going to wrap thisup a little bit. And then we are
going to Sarah is going to comeback and we're going to go into
more of a instead of just, thisis kind of like, um, this was
impostor syndrome. 101. Right.
But what I want us to talk aboutwhen we get together, again, is
a little bit more about whatbusinesses and people that
(32:43):
aren't impacted. Let me say itthat way, people that are not
impacted by impostor syndrome,what can what can what can we
do? How can we support? How canwe get rid of it? How can we
support these women? And I alsowant to talk a little bit then
too, about just kind ofcontinuing to up end this system
(33:04):
that no longer serves any of uswell, even the ones that it
supposedly serves, I don't thinkit serves them very well,
because they're having to live alittle bit of this life. So in
closing, what would you like?
What any closing comments beforewe sign off on this
Sara (33:24):
closing comments, I would say, I will take a page from
Brave not perfect, and to saythat everybody deserves the
opportunity to take a risk andto embrace some imperfections.
And that is part of life. Right?
And, and I can say that from aprivileged, privileged position.
(33:46):
And also recognize that thereare inequities that I faced too,
and that it's okay to stand inyour own space, as our friend
Lisa says, stand in yourbrilliance. Right, right, and
lift each other
Kristen Daukas (34:05):
up. And that, my friends, is something you will
hear me talk about all the time.
Going back to what I saidearlier, it's like, you know,
make sure you've got a goodsquad around you that surrounds
you. And if you don't find a newsquad, because they're not for
you, and when you do need them,they're not going to be there,
at least not to help you.
They'll be there to watch youfall. But that's about it. So
(34:28):
till next time, my friends,thank you for tuning in and I
will catch you on the flip side.
As the saying goes, you don'thave to go home but you can't
stay here and that's a wrap forthis week's episode. A big
thanks to my guests for sharingtheir story and to you for
listening. Don't forget to sharethe show with your friends and
(34:48):
spread the words and if you'dlike to be a guest on the show,
the link is in the show notestill next time cheers
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Intentionally Disturbing
Join me on this podcast as I navigate the murky waters of human behavior, current events, and personal anecdotes through in-depth interviews with incredible people—all served with a generous helping of sarcasm and satire. After years as a forensic and clinical psychologist, I offer a unique interview style and a low tolerance for bullshit, quickly steering conversations toward depth and darkness. I honor the seriousness while also appreciating wit. I’m your guide through the twisted labyrinth of the human psyche, armed with dark humor and biting wit.