Don’t Let Imposter Syndrome Derail Your Next Job Interview, with Jess Guzik

You’re in the interview room and the hiring manager asks a question you don’t know the answer to. Does it derail you entirely, or make you feel stupid or unprepared? Find Your Dream Job guest Jess Guzik says imposter syndrome can do all those things, even for highly skilled employees. To combat it, Jess suggests practicing interview questions beforehand and having a few stories or past experiences ready to share that can apply across the board. Jess also says to stop expecting yourself to be perfect and accept that you are enough right where you are. 

About Our Guest:

Jess Guzik is a career and an executive coach. Jess also hosts The Art of Speaking Up podcast.

Resources in This Episode:

• Are you ready to develop an authentic, powerful voice that enables you to succeed professionally? Find out how Jess can help you by visiting her website at jessguzikcoaching.com.
• Connect with Jess on LinkedIn.

Transcript

Find Your Dream Job, Episode 489:

Don’t Let Imposter Syndrome Derail Your Next Job Interview, with Jess Guzik

Airdate: February 19, 2025

Mac Prichard:

This is Find Your Dream Job, the podcast that helps you get hired, have the career you want, and make a difference in life.

I’m your host, Mac Prichard. I’m also the founder of Mac’s List. It’s a job board in the Pacific Northwest that helps you find a fulfilling career.

Every Wednesday, I talk to a different expert about the tools you need to get the work you want.

Confidence matters.

Especially when you meet a hiring manager.

You don’t want doubts about your skills and abilities to stop you from showing your best self to an employer.

Jess Guzik is here to talk about how to not let imposter syndrome derail your next job interview.

She’s a career and an executive coach.

Jess also hosts The Art of Speaking Up podcast.

She joins us from Los Angeles, California.

Well, let’s jump into it, Jess. Let’s start with definitions. What is imposter syndrome, exactly?

Jess Guzik:

I define it as this feeling that we kind of snuck in, and we’re in this incredible job position, but we didn’t really earn our way there, we got there by accident, and sometimes we experience this fear that at any minute, somebody is going to realize that we don’t have the skills that we need and everything that we’ve built is going to fall apart.

Mac Prichard:

Why does this happen, Jess? Especially to people who, on the outside, are so successful?

Jess Guzik:

Yeah, there are so many different reasons why. I think a big one, and one that I relate to personally, is a lot of us high achievers are perfectionists and we hold ourselves to these enormously high standards, and I think a lot of times the standards that we’re holding for ourselves in our minds are actually much, much higher than what our employers want us to bring to the table and what is needed for us to be successful, and so we feel like we aren’t bringing enough just because we expect this unrealistic level of performance and I think another reason that it happens is, again, for type A, overachievers, we really struggle to notice what we’re doing well, and to truly take in our strengths and our accomplishments.

It’s almost like our mind is a leaky bucket and any time we accomplish something or build a new skill, it’s as if it never happened and so we find ourselves in this perpetual cycle of achieving and gathering more skills, but we struggle to really see ourselves accumulating those skills so we always have this feeling that we don’t know enough or we’re missing something.

Mac Prichard:

Is this something that only happens to type A, overachievers, or can it affect anyone?

Jess Guzik:

I think it can affect anyone. My mind often goes to the type A, overachievers because I definitely identify as a recovering type A, overachiever, and I tend to attract those types of people to my work, so that’s usually the type of person that I have in mind, but I think any time we’re in a situation that’s new or different or we’re stretching ourselves outside of our comfort zone, it’s really natural, no matter what our personality is, for us to suddenly become aware of the ways in which our skillset is imperfect and the way in which we don’t have every single trait that we think we need to have to succeed in whatever it is we’re pursuing.

Mac Prichard:

We’re talking today about how imposter syndrome can affect your performance in a job interview. Are people more likely to experience imposter syndrome, Jess, during a job search?

Jess Guzik:

100%. It’s probably the number one thing that brings it up and part of the reason for that is because when we’re job searching, and especially when we’re interviewing, what we’re doing is we’re presenting our best self to the employer.

We’re showing them how good we are, we’re showing them that we’re qualified, and if we have thoughts in the back of our mind that we aren’t qualified and we aren’t good at what we’re doing, we’re going to experience so much dissonance in that process because on the outside we’re telling them how great we are and on the inside we’re having these thoughts that we aren’t great at our job and it creates all of this emotional unrest and discomfort in the process and I see that a lot when people are job searching, interviewing, and also transitioning into the new job that they end up landing.

Mac Prichard:

You’re in the interview room, you’re talking to the hiring manager, how does that dissonance shape your response to the questions that you might get from an employer?

Jess Guzik:

One way that I see it come up is, people will get asked a hard question, or maybe a question that they don’t have a perfect answer to, and their brain will immediately jump to, “I have nothing to offer. They caught me. This is going to be the question that tanks the interview.” And in reality, there is actually quite a lot that they could bring to answer that question, it’s just that they’re so worried about the imposter syndrome that they fail to see all of the talents and all of the skills that they can creatively draw on to answer the question.

This is sometimes where an outside perspective can be really helpful. Often someone will say, “I don’t know how to answer this question.” And I’ll say, “Okay, well, talk me through your skill set and what you do know how to do.” And I’ll be able to find 5 different things that they can bring to answer the question, but they can’t see it, because their immediate reaction was, “Oh, gosh, they’re asking about this and I don’t have a perfect answer,” or, “This isn’t an area that I feel like is one of my top strengths.”

Mac Prichard:

What do you do in that situation, Jess, when that happens?

Jess Guzik:

It’s tricky. I think the first thing that you have to do is just take a bit of a breath and slow down because it is really scary when we’re put on the spot and asked a hard question and don’t feel prepared to answer it.

If we can just slow ourselves down in the moment, that helps us feel more resourced internally, to be flexible and creative. I think it’s really important to remember, in that moment, that our job isn’t to have the perfect answer, our job is to be a leader in that moment and to really try to push ourselves to find some internal strength and creativity within ourselves and use that to come up with something that shows the interviewer that we can navigate a difficult question.

I don’t even think it’s about having the perfect answer. I think it’s about showing the interviewer, no matter what comes up, I will navigate through it and I will be able to stay engaged in conversation.

Mac Prichard:

That’s what you should do, be a leader and give a response, but how do you do that, Jess? How do you, especially if you’re feeling a moment of panic or brain freeze because of imposter syndrome, what steps do you recommend your clients follow in crafting that answer on the spot?

Jess Guzik:

Yes, well, the first thing is it’s so important and helpful to let go of that self-critical monologue that’s going to start playing in your mind because that prevents you from thinking creatively and being present, so try to notice if you’re having any thoughts like you’re bombing the interview, this is going so poorly, why do you always mess things up, and if you can, just imagine putting those thoughts in the backseat of the car, or putting those thoughts to the side, and then one thing that can be really helpful is to think about what’s an imperfect messy answer that I can give to this question?

I can’t come up with something perfect. I don’t have the perfect packaged thing top of mind, but what’s something imperfect that I can start with? Often, once we get going we start to generate additional ideas. If we can get ourselves past that moment of freeze and that moment of internal panic, and just get ourselves talking, so often, then, our mind starts to open up and we start to be able to access other thoughts and ideas and we’re able to come up with something.

Another tip that I would share because I know for some people, coming up with something on the spot can feel so difficult, it’s always helpful to have a bank of stories and ideas that you can draw on. Typically, when people are prepping for an interview they prep specific answers to questions, but it’s also just helpful to have a little bank of stories, thoughts, and ideas, that don’t necessarily map to a specific question but that you can draw on in the moment if you get asked something that you can’t think of an answer to.

I really like to think about it as, most of what I would talk about in an interview, I’ve actually already thought about beforehand and if I get asked a question that feels a little bit challenging, I’m just going to find something in that outline that can fit into that question. That can really, really help alleviate the anxiety of getting asked something that you don’t have a perfect answer for.

Mac Prichard:

Well, let’s take a break.

When we come back, Jess, I want to talk more about the role preparation plays in an interview, especially when you’re trying to overcome imposter syndrome.

Stay with us.

When we return, Jess Guzik will continue to share her advice on how to not let imposter syndrome derail your next job interview.

We’re back in the Mac’s List studio. I’m talking with Jess Guzik.

She’s a career and an executive coach.

Jess also hosts the terrific show, The Art of Speaking Up podcast.

She joins us from Los Angeles, California.

Now, Jess, before the break, we were talking about how to not let imposter syndrome derail your next job interview. At the end of the first segment, you recommended that people who are dealing with imposter syndrome walk into the interview room with a bank of stories and think about possible questions before sitting down with a hiring manager.

As you’ve described people who are likely to have imposter syndrome, perfectionism comes up a lot, and I’d imagine a perfectionist is going to do all of those things. They’re going to think about likely questions, they’re going to have those answers and stories ready, and yet they still struggle. How does that happen, Jess?

Jess Guzik:

Yeah, so this comes up so much. I think that sometimes we’re dealing with an emotional struggle and our hope is that if we just find the right tactical solution, the emotions will go away. In the context of a job interview, if someone’s feeling nervous, uncertain, or afraid, the hope is, “If I just prepare enough, these feelings will go away.” What I find is that’s not usually the case.

I find that the better approach is to say, “These feelings are here because this is a really hard, scary situation. I’m being stretched and I’m being challenged. Instead of hoping that these feelings go away, I want to do my best to become someone who can bring a really strong presence even when I feel afraid and uncertain.”

That’s sometimes the less attractive path forward because we want our discomfort to go away, but ultimately that’s what helps us become more confident and more resilient and it helps us feel less like we have to control how everything goes, so that we don’t have any moments of struggle, and we go in feeling more like, “Okay, this is going to be hard. Things might not be perfect, but I feel good about my ability to show up for it. Even if things feel difficult. Even if I have a moment where I feel like I don’t have the perfect answer prepared.”

Mac Prichard:

Perfectionism has come up a lot in our conversation today. Talk, Jess, about mindset and how choosing a mindset of resourcefulness can help you overcome perfectionism and the imposter syndrome that appears to follow when you’re a perfectionist.

Jess Guzik:

A big, big piece of imposter syndrome is this assumption that our value as an employee and our value in the interview comes from being perfect, having the perfect answer, always knowing what to do, and we bring that same mindset into the job itself, not just into the interview. What I really try to encourage people to do is to stop putting so much value in being perfect and always having the answer, and instead put all the value on resourcefulness.

Resourcefulness means when I don’t have the answer, I roll up my sleeves and go get the answer, and not only is that way more valuable to an employer, because you’re way more versatile and adaptable, but also that’s something within your control.

Even if your skillset isn’t perfect, even if you don’t always have all the answers, being scrappy, being determined, being resourceful, that’s something that you can choose to do, and I know for me, and so many women that I’ve talked with, that creates so much internal security, to know that they can create their success based on a trait that feels like it’s within their control and a trait that they identify with because most people who are perfectionists are very committed and resourceful, and they never give themself credit for that, and they never see how powerful that makes them in terms of their effectiveness.

They just get super hung up on the things they think they’re missing and the ways in which they think they’re imperfect.

Mac Prichard:

Give us examples, Jess, of how you see your clients take that approach to resourcefulness into a job interview to overcome imposter syndrome. What are they doing, exactly?

Jess Guzik:

Yeah, I think that one example would be if the interviewer asked them, “How would you go about doing XYZ?”

Perfectionism would say, “Oh, there’s one answer that they’re looking for and I can’t think of what it is, and I don’t know how to answer this question so I’m not going to get hired for this role.”

Whereas, resourcefulness would be like, “Okay, I don’t know the answer to this question, but if I got this question on day one of the job, what would I do? Oh, I would probably reach out to someone to try to learn more, then I would look for what institutional knowledge we’ve developed  around this, and then I would form a plan, and I would share that plan with my boss.”

Then, all of a sudden, this question went from, “I have no idea,” to, “Oh, I could actually take steps to move this forward.” And that answer is going to be really impressive for the interviewer because they can see you’re problem-solving and they can see your leadership and how you approach situations that are new and that require a little bit of diligence and a little bit of creativity.

Mac Prichard:

So you’re showing problem-solving, you’re showing leadership, you’re showing diligence. Why can it be challenging for someone who is dealing with imposter syndrome to see that that, in fact, is appealing to employers and is a good answer in the interview room?

Jess Guzik:

I was thinking about that a lot before this interview, and I really think a big part of this is because in school we all learned that the way that we create success is to show up on the day of the test and have the right answer. It’s this one, high-stakes moment, and we have to have the answers and if we don’t have the answers at that moment, we don’t achieve the success that we’re hoping to achieve.

I think we treat job interviews and jobs in that way, where we think, I have to show up, I have to have the answer at the moment, and that’s how I get an A. When, in reality, the professional world doesn’t operate that way. We rarely start with the answer.

We don’t just come in and recite all our knowledge and then go home. It’s usually this iterative process of we get something messy, and we hack away at it, and we slowly move the project forward, and when we can truly see that, that it’s not about getting an A on the test, it’s not about having all of the answers memorized, you don’t have to have anything memorized. You just have to be willing to find the next step.

I think that can help people see, “Oh, it’s not about me having the answer. It’s about me finding or getting the answer.”

Mac Prichard:

We’ve all taken those tests in school and we’ve all had those anxiety dreams at night about the exam and not knowing the answers. What about the rest of our past, Jess?

How can someone’s past experience shape them in a way that leads to dealing with imposter syndrome and how do you overcome that?

Jess Guzik:

Yeah, our relationship with ourselves and what we believe success looks like is really shaped in our early developmental years when we’re little, and our brains are learning so many things about the world. Including, “Why am I valuable? What makes me valuable? What does it mean for me to be doing a good job?”

For many of my clients, a pattern that I see is if they had very strict parents, or parents who expected a high level of performance, they might come into part of their adult lives, and into the workplace, and into a job interview, with a really, really high expectation, and when that happens, I think we have to be really compassionate with ourselves because it is sometimes a longer process of unlearning some of those things, but as soon as we start to recognize that the pressure that we’re putting on ourselves isn’t this objective standard that we have to meet, but it’s actually something internally that we’re assuming we have to meet, it can really feel like a relief because, all of a sudden, we can start to see that maybe who we are, the messy person who we are, who’s good at some things and bad at other things, maybe that’s enough to create the success that we want. Maybe that’s enough to nail the job interview and to really crush it in the role.

Mac Prichard:

Well, it’s been a terrific conversation, Jess. Now, tell us, what’s next for you?

Jess Guzik:

What’s next is always my podcast. I’m the host of The Art of Speaking Up, and the mission of my show is to help professional women build confidence, become a really powerful voice in the room, and ultimately, accelerate their path to leadership in their 9-5 role.

Mac Prichard:

Terrific. I know listeners can learn more about you and your work and your podcast by visiting your website, jessguzikcoaching.com. We’ll include that URL in the shownotes, and that you also invite listeners to connect with you on LinkedIn. When you do reach out to Jess, please tell her you heard her on Find Your Dream Job.

Now, Jess, given all of the great advice that you’ve shared today, what’s the one thing you want a listener to remember about how to not let imposter syndrome derail your next job interview?

Jess Guzik:

The one thing that I would most want someone to remember is that who you are right now is enough. Sometimes, when imposter syndrome comes up in a really big way, for myself or for a client that I’m supporting, I like to say, “So what?”

What if it is true? What if it is true that I’m missing a bunch of skills? What if it is true that I’m imperfect? Now what? Am I still going to go for it? Do I still think I can do it? Am I still going to give it my all?

Instead of trying to be perfect, I would say build the muscle of learning that your imperfect, current self, can already do it. That will get you so, so, so much farther than trying to fill in every skills gap that you think you have.

My last reminder would be, that if you feel messy, if you feel imperfect, it literally doesn’t matter. You can still go out and do a beautiful job in the interview and create big success in whatever role you land.

Mac Prichard:

Next week, our guest will be Julissa Vasquez.

She’s the people and culture director for Adelante Mujeres.

It’s an Oregon-based nonprofit that’s building a more just society by empowering Latinas to lead.

Employers can tell when you’re excited about a job.

And when you’re not.

So focus on the positions that excite you, says Julissa, and strategies that share your enthusiasm.

Join us next Wednesday when Julissa Vasquez and I talk about how to show you really want the job.

Until next time, thanks for letting us help you find your dream job.

This show is produced by Mac’s List.

Susan Thornton-Hough schedules our guests and writes our newsletter. Lisa Kislingbury Anderson manages our social media.

Our sound engineer and editor is Matt Fiorillo. Dawn Mole creates our transcripts. And our music is by Freddy Trujillo.

This is Mac Prichard. See you next week.