Imposter Syndrome with Jenny Brady (Episode 62) | Jenny invites you to welcome and reframe your imposter moments
For this episode of the Research Adjacent podcast Sarah welcomes back a previous podcast guest, coach and facilitator Jenny Brady, for an in-depth conversation about imposter syndrome.
This episode is part of our Challenges Series – conversations which take a deep dive into common concerns for research-adjacent professionals including sticky situations and mindset gremlins.
Reframing imposter sydrome as imposter moments
Jenny specialises in coaching researchers around impact and entrepreneurship. Imposter experiences come up a lot – both for herself and the people she works with – and it has become a real area of interest for her.
“If you’re a human being, it’s likely that at some point you have felt what would be described as an imposter moment, and particularly within academia.”
Imposter syndrome is often defined as the feeling that you are a fraud and you are going to be found out. This is how Jenny describes it.
“So imagine you’re at a fancy party, and you’re all dressed to the nines, and you feel like I’m not meant to be here. I haven’t got quite the right shoes on, or quite the right dress, or there’s that feeling of ‘I don’t quite fit in here’. And imposter moments are a little bit like that. It’s when you feel like a fraud, even when you’ve got the invite in your hand and it’s been sent to you through the post and hand delivered to you.”
Jenny uses the term ‘imposter moments’ rather than ‘imposter syndrome’ as it helps to reframe these experiences as a normal and fleeting part of our human experience, rather than a sign there is something wrong with us.
“I personally prefer to call it imposter moments. Now that’s not my term. I worked with somebody recently and she mentioned it, and I said, of course, that’s exactly the right thing to call it. Because it’s not a syndrome, it’s not a recognised medical condition, and it’s not there all the time, making you doubt absolutely every decision. So imposter moments are a much friendlier way to welcome those experiences”
Why imposter moments are so common for research adjacent professionals
As normal as these experiences are, the feelings are certainly real, and a hugely common experience for research-adjacent professionals. The biggest trigger is the fact that research-adjacent professionals are often working alongside highly qualified, knowledgeable and esteemed subject experts.
“And I think that imposter moments show up for research adjacent professionals a lot, because there is a true expectation that we’re meant to have all the answers. We’re in this pivotal role of helping all of these important and clever people do their wondrous thing. And you show up and everyone speaks a different language, the behaviors are unusual, people measure weird things and you think am I meant to care about that.”
How to navigate imposter moments
Fortunately Jenny has advice on how to navigate imposter moments when they show up. Her first suggestion is to consider what evidence we have to support the thought and whether it is accurate or useful. Secondly she advises ‘naming and reframing’. This is about recognising a thought like ‘I’m not as smart as everybody else here’ and perhaps reframing it as ‘I was selected for this job because I bring these unique contributions’.
Her final suggestion is to stop using the word ‘just’.
“So you tell yourself, I’m ‘just’ a student, or I’m ‘just’ the new person. ‘Just’ removes your agency, but it also removes your responsibility to get to know things more and to immerse yourself further in the places where you can actually contribute and be useful and valuable. So remove the ‘just’ and become the ‘I am’.”
She also highlights how important it is not to compare yourself to people who are much further ahead on their journey. And also how important it is to recognise the valuable contribution that you make – through the analogy of bike nut-tighteners!
“So you go to the showroom and see the fancy bikes, and the sales people help you choose, and it’s amazing. And you cycle off the forecourt, and the bike falls to pieces because the people in the workshop who tighten the nuts didn’t show up that day because they thought, ‘well, I’m not important enough, because I’m not the designer of the beautiful bit of kit’. So all hail nut-tighteners, my favorite people, because they make the world go round. And I think research-adjacent professionals are the same. Without them, stuff doesn’t happen as well.”
All hail nut-tighteners! And all hail research-adjacent professionals!
Find out more
- Connect with Jenny on LinkedIn
- Listen to Jenny’s previous appearance on the podcast
- Download the Career Compass worksheet
Theme music by Lemon Music Studios from Pixabay
Episode Transcript
Jenny Brady 00:00
So if you’re a human being, it’s likely that at some point you have felt what would be described as an imposter moment. I think that imposter moments show up for research-adjacent professionals a lot, because there is a true expectation, still, that we’re meant to have all the answers. Let’s make it easier to ask for help. That’s what resilience is in my mind, it’s about saying I don’t have everything. Can you help?
Sarah McLusky 00:27
Hello there. I’m Sarah McLusky, and this is Research Adjacent. Each episode, I talk to amazing research-adjacent professionals about what they do and why it makes a difference. Keep listening to find out why we think the research-adjacent space is where the real magic happens.
Sarah McLusky 00:48
Hello and welcome to Research Adjacent. This episode is the first of a new Challenges mini series where I’ll be taking a deep dive into concerns which crop up again and again for research-adjacent professionals. As you’ll know if you’ve been listening for a while, I always ask my guests about the challenges that they’ve faced in their career. I also ask the same question in workshops, and of course, I’ve got my own experiences to draw on too, and a few particular sticky situations and mindset gremlins keep coming up. They include imposter moments, isolation, constant change, influencing others and a lack of development opportunities. These are not necessarily unique to research-adjacent professionals, but they are very common, often due to the workplace culture of research organizations and the way that research-adjacent roles are situated within them. Well, I wanted to do something to help, to offer insights, to help you feel less alone, and perhaps some practical tips to make things feel more manageable. I decided to find some brilliant research-adjacent folks who have navigated these challenges themselves and had some wisdom to share. So at the moment, I’m working on pulling together five episodes for the time being, each of which will focus on a different topic to make sure that you’re among the first to know about each episode, check that you’re following the show in your podcast app, and sign up for the podcast newsletter as well. You’ll find a link in the show notes.
Sarah McLusky 02:09
So today, for our first episode, the focus is imposter syndrome, or imposter moments, as I am now going to call them, with coach and facilitator, Jenny Brady. You might remember Jenny from Episode 16, and if you haven’t listened to that episode, you’ll find a link in the show notes, or just search through the podcast back catalogue. Back in that episode, Jenny talked a bit about how imposter moments have shown up in her career. So I thought I would get her back to tell us more. In our conversation, we talk about why imposter moments are an inevitable part of being human, as well as why they’re so common for research adjacent professionals. And then, of course, we talk about what you can do about them. So if you have ever had those wobbly moments when you are sure that you are about to be found out, then this episode is for you. Listen on for some invaluable insights.
Sarah McLusky 03:00
Welcome back to the podcast, Jenny, it’s so lovely to have you back again, and we’re going to be doing a little bit of a different episode this time, because we’re going to be talking about a very specific topic, which is going to be imposter syndrome, if we call it that. Maybe we’ll come back and think about exactly what we do call it. I wonder if you could just say a quick hello and tell us a bit about you, just quick introduction for anybody who hasn’t listened to your first episode.
Sarah McLusky 03:29
Thanks Sarah and thank you for inviting me back as well. As you say my name is Jenny, and I’m a professional coach, researcher development specialist and facilitator, and I spend my time helping individuals to identify, apply and enjoy their personal, societal and potentially commercial impact of their research or of their choices. So it’s quite a varied role, but I very much spend most of my time working alongside academic partners.
Sarah McLusky 04:00
Yeah fantastic. And when we first did that first interview, we talked a little bit about imposter experiences then, which is one of the reasons I wanted to get you back. And I know it’s something that you talk about a lot in the work that you do with academics. Tell me why is this something that you got interested in in the first place?
Jenny Brady 04:21
I think it’s because it affects all of us. So if you’re a human being, it’s likely that at some point you have felt what would be described as an imposter moment, and particularly within academia, I had my own moments, and they showed up pretty much every day. I worked at a high profile University, I was put into a research role, research adjacent role, should I say, as a non researcher, in a team with people who had amazing PhDs that were, you know, life changing, changing. These people were intelligent, useful, impactful people, and I hadn’t done any of that, and yet, here was my responsibility to go and help researchers at every stage in every field of study to be more enterprising. And I had no idea where to start. So there was full on panic and sort of squeaky knees moments, and I thought, well, I need to go and understand what this is in order for me to actually make have my own personal and professional impact and development. So rather than sitting there sort of staring at the wall and thinking, oh my goodness, what now, I went and asked some questions, and I found out what actually makes researchers tick. And I was genuinely interested in that anyway, because people are interesting, and I found that lots of their fears aligned with my own. So suddenly we were related in terms of what our intentions were, what our fears were. And I looked into ways of overcoming this, both for myself, but also to help those researchers to make progress in a way that was meaningful for them. So imposterism, imposter moments, imposter syndrome, all of that stuff, of feeling like a fraud was very much first hand experience. And then I realized that actually most people around us are feeling that at some point, and the research that I did and the work that I did helped me to understand it a lot more and make use of it, but also to come up with ways and to understand other proven practices of how others can overcome anything that’s holding them back from something that they don’t want to be held back from. So yeah, very much personal experience, and then going out and finding asking questions and realizing, Oh, we’re all feeling very similar here.
Sarah McLusky 06:43
And I think that’s that’s a lovely way to start it, because that’s exactly what’s come up with some of the people, the research adjacent professionals that I talk to, both guests I’ve had on the podcast, and then also people that I’ve talked to in workshops and just events and things like that, is that these imposter experiences are really, really common amongst just human beings, but, but they seem to be particularly an issue, people keep telling me about for people who work in these research adjacent roles, who are working alongside these people, who are very qualified, very knowledgeable, and yeah, and I just wanted to have a conversation about it so we can give people some advice on how they might be able to just manage those feelings when they come up. So the first things first, what do we mean by imposter syndrome? What are why do some people like that term? Why do some people not like that term? What are we going to call it?
Jenny Brady 07:43
Okay so the dictionary. I’ve got a dictionary definition in front of me, so see what you think of this, the persistent inability to believe that one’s success is deserved or has been legitimately achieved as a result of one’s own efforts or skills. So that’s directly lifted from the dictionary, and it basically means I achieved a thing, and I don’t believe I did that on merit, that somebody somewhere is going to knock on the door and say, Oh, we didn’t mean you. You’re not meant to be here. We met the person sitting next to you. You’ve been here how long? It wasn’t meant to last that long, etc, etc. So imagine you’re at a fancy party, and you’re all dressed to the nines, and the whole time, you feel like I’m not meant to be here. I haven’t got quite the right shoes on, or quite the right dress, or, you know, there’s that feeling of I don’t quite fit in here. And imposter moments are a little bit like that. It’s when you feel like a fraud, even when you’ve got the invite in your hand and it’s been sent to you through the post and hand delivered to you, and that you doubt that your real achievements are actually real, or that they are valuable achievements. I had somebody recently, as was part of a coaching conversation, who said that her partner had said, Oh, here’s a job ad in academia and and, and it was for researcher development, actually. And her immediate response to that suggestion of you’d be really good at this job was, what, me, have you met me before? You know why me? Maybe he’s just being nice, because clearly I’m a tragic mess. So we worked on this understanding of what it is to feel valued and to feel welcomed, and there is that sense of I didn’t do it because I worked hard. I did it through luck, somebody opened a door for me, and ever since then, all my success has been attributed to that one person, and anything I got wrong since then has been my fault. So there is this sort of persistence, I think that’s a good word in the dictionary definition, and the ability inability to believe in your own success and your own connections and your own sense of achievement. In terms of definition, I personally prefer to call it imposter moments. Now that’s not my term. I worked with somebody recently on imposter syndrome, and she mentioned it, and I said, of course, that’s exactly the right thing to call it, because it’s not a syndrome, it’s not a recognized medical condition, and it’s not there all the time, making you doubt absolutely every decision. Otherwise, right now, we’d all be under the duvet, hiding from life in general, or I’d still be, you know, staring at that wall 15 years ago, wondering what on earth I’m meant to be doing next. So it shows up as moments, and those moments actually sometimes can be quite useful. And when I work with teams or groups and one to one coaching as well, very often, we can recognize there’s some good bits here in those moments, and particularly because they don’t last forever, because we would just stop existing, we wouldn’t be able to manage with them all of the time, but sometimes they can be quite a huge obstacle. They can be a challenge that’s really hard to overcome, but all of those moments, either positive or otherwise, can be managed. And I think boxing them off as moments helps them immediately to become a little bit more manageable than this feeling of there’s something wrong with me, I’m wired incorrectly, or I’m incapable of doing anything better than I’m already doing. So imposter moments are a much friendlier way to welcome those experiences, rather than be fighting it all of the time.
Sarah McLusky 11:38
Yeah, I think I really like that as well, because as you say, it frames it as these are things, you know, nobody feels like that all the time in every part of their life. There are things. It’s these feelings come and go and depending on the situation. And yeah, the the the argument against imposter syndrome isn’t it, is that a syndrome is like a medical condition and something that’s persistent and something that’s there all the time, and it’s almost kind of medicalizing being a normal human being in a strange way. So I can see why syndrome isn’t the right word, but it’s finding that, you know, it’s that, it’s that balance between something everybody recognizes and appreciates and then, as you say, making it a bit more manageable. And a moment really does make it feel like something that’s fleeting and that comes and goes. Yeah, so, so, yeah, definitely, I’ve had my own experiences like you, of those imposter moments coming up, and the things that people tell me of why it’s such a big challenge in research adjacent world, maybe I’ll give my own example which which might help to explain is that I’d spent so I did a PhD in science, and then spent the first 15 years of my career working in science, and then I took a job as a project manager in an arts and humanities research project. The skills were very much transferable over you know, it was doing stuff I really knew how to do, running events, managing a project, doing public engagement, all that sort of stuff, you know, really solid. But I was then thrown in with academics who were talking about stuff I literally had no idea about. I remember going to the first talk, and it was a philosophy seminar, and, and what I remember thinking afterwards is they’re using words that I recognize, but they’re putting them together in an order that makes absolutely no sense to me and and it took me quite a long time to get my head around the fact that I didn’t need to understand that research. Well, not in the level that they did. I needed that kind of superficial level, but I didn’t need to understand the detail I was there to do the other part of the job, so lots of people have told me about having similar kinds of experiences working in the research adjacent world, even people who are even though they are really accomplished in the thing they’re really being employed to do. You know, whether it’s project management, whether it’s communications, whether it’s training and development, but they don’t understand the research at the same level, and I think that’s one of the reasons it’s really challenging.
Jenny Brady 14:30
Yeah, very much so. And I think certainly in academic communities and environments, it’s showing up every day in terms of people’s feelings and responses to challenges and how they manage their own personal resilience and professional response to things as well. Thinking back to when I was within a university and as a researcher developer and I my role was as I mentioned, to cover the entire university with the golden thread of enterprising behaviors and mindsets. So that meant that on my first day of doing that, I decided that I needed to know everything about everybody’s research. Now, this is a big university, and I was one human being, so I’d set myself up for the biggest fall or fail that I could have ever have dreamt up on day one, and it took me, I don’t know, three or four months to realize actually, this isn’t going to work. Because, you know, from one hour to the next, I’d be working with people who are specialists in flood waters in Nepal, who were trying to use carrots for energy, to fuel things, etc, etc. Those are the two that just jump out of me. And I could give you hundreds, and it just wasn’t working. And I think the day that I realized that actually my reason to be here is to be interested, to a certain extent, I don’t have to be interesting to anybody, and I have to help these people to make good decisions, to be a thinking partner, to help them think straight and think out loud, and then it’s up to them whatever happens next. So my intentions were to be useful and to learn some stuff along the way, because who isn’t interested, but also to realize what my role was, and to to put a boundary around that. And the minute I did that, I freed myself up. I breathed out loud, Ah, here we go. Now I can start working properly, because I was getting in my own way. And I think that imposter moments show up for research adjacent professionals a lot, because there is a true expectation still, in 2025, and beyond, I imagine, that we’re meant to have all the answers, that we’re in this pivotal role of helping all of these important and clever people do their wondrous thing. And that’s right to an extent, but it’s actually to what level are you there to help? And your experience of being employed in that role is absolutely right. You You got the job on merit because of your previous experience, and they needed that. That’s the bit they couldn’t do. And you know, there’s this feeling of we’re meant to know all the hacks and how to how the university works and how people are meant to connect, and who everybody is. And also, I think that there is this sense of within universities are their own little cultures. And there’s a university culture, certainly then there’s research culture, and then within that, there’s their own sort of little countries, if you will. And you show up, and you used to live in one country, and then you move to another, and everyone speaks a different language. The behaviors are unusual. People measure weird things that you think, am I meant to care about that because I’m meant to get people in a room by 12 o’clock and that, you know, and that the training that’s happening is meant to be useful to them, but they’re asking me about publications and how to pay for certain things and has the grant come in. Yet I’m not sure what I’m meant to be doing here. So there is this overarching feeling that we’re meant as researcher development professionals, meant to know it all, and yet we feel like quite often we don’t know enough. And I think that it’s it’s easy to begin with panic, particularly if you’re new in a role, and if you’re on your own. Quite often that is the case. Teams are relatively small. Researchers are quite well supported, but the researcher developers themselves, quite often, are on their own. So I think that there’s this understanding between if you get every researcher development professional in a room, research adjacent professionals, they’d all go, oh yeah, I feel like that too. So there’s a real need for us to say out loud, I don’t know the answer to that, but I’m interested enough to go and find out, and I’m helpful and I’m useful, and I’m actually well connected. That’s your role, to do the research is somebody else’s job. And honestly, that’s like an aha moment. I realized what I’m here to do, and I think it’s interesting as well, because if you move from one area to another. So you may have been a researcher and then start to become a research adjacent professional. There can be a temptation to think in a particular way, whereas, actually it’s useful for you to consider it from a different perspective. And it can be a clash of two worlds sometimes as well. You know, you wander through a door into humanities from a science background, and everything just the landscape is just slightly different, but you’re expected to understand. So I think there’s a real opportunity here for culture within academia to shift slightly into making it easy to say, I don’t know the answer. Do I need to know the answer? And I. And let’s all help each other. So I’m here to be useful and helpful in all the right places, and I’m going to leave the rest of it to you, and that’s okay, and that’s a conscious decision. And some of the adjustments, I think that are expected of people who either career transition or that are new to something that they haven’t previously done, like I was that those adjustments aren’t always reasonable, that you’re not meant to know all those acronyms in week one and and do you, if you were to ask any senior academic, what does this acronym mean? Nine out of 10 times, they’d say, I don’t know, but it opens the door, so I say it anyway. So there’s all these weird sort of behaviors that we take on that I’m not sure, are always useful, but knowing where you are invited to contribute and to be at peace with that is absolutely the first stage, and it quietens those imposter moment noises down a little bit to say it’s all right, I’m in control of this. This is my bit, and the rest of it is someone else’s, and that’s okay. And I don’t mean to say to just completely disengage or unhook yourself from the other stuff, because, as you rightly say, it’s useful to have an awareness, but to be to be completely immersed in it, is actually inappropriate and will get in the way. So being true about to yourself, about what you’re there to do, is, is a, just a lovely moment, yeah? Encourage it for everybody Absolutely.
Sarah McLusky 21:28
Yeah. I think that sense of really focusing on, you know, my job, these are the things that I’m here to do. These are the things that I’m good at. That’s not only is it, you know, you stay in your lane, you stick with the things you feel good about. I mean, that’s just a massive confidence boost in and of itself. You know, sometimes just looking and say, yeah, right, okay, maybe they know all this stuff about quantum physics or French philosophy, um, but they don’t know how to do a mail merge, or they don’t know how to run an event, or they don’t know how to, you know, get people in a room and talking to each other, and it’s thinking about, what are the things that I’m good at? And that’s why I’m here, and that’s what my job is. And I can put those other things aside, easier said than done. Sometimes it has to be said and often, often a work in progress.
Sarah McLusky 22:25
Do you ever feel like you’re stumbling around in your career journey without a map? Sometimes you need to pause check where you are and recalibrate your Career Compass to help you do that, I have a new downloadable worksheet which will guide you through assessing your current situation, figuring out what you would most like to improve and taking your first step on the journey towards your new career, North Star. You can download the worksheet for free at research adjacent.com/compass, or use the link in the show notes. That’s research adjacent.com/compass.
Sarah McLusky 22:57
Are there any things that you’ve found that can be useful to do that process of separating out?
Jenny Brady 23:06
Yeah, there’s, there’s lots of tips and techniques and special things that are out there that people can look into and and my disclaimer with any of these sort of top tips is they won’t all settle with everybody, yeah, but there are, it’s sort of a pick and mix, choose what sits with you and discard the rest, or have a go at things and see which one settles best with you. And I think the first and the most proven practice and something that is used worldwide and is really useful for research related people and activities, is looking for evidence. So rather than deciding, because it feels that way, that that is true, what evidence do you have in order to back that up? And there’s sort of a proven technique. So if I give you an example of somebody that I worked with fairly recently, let’s call her Amina, pardon me, and she recently joined University down south as a researcher developer, and she was new to that role. Her expertise sounds very much like yours, where she was really good at connecting people, and really good at noticing what people needed in order to progress their careers. She was very career focused in terms of her expertise, and she arrived in the department, and despite all her qualifications and prior experience and things like that, she felt really overwhelmed by all of this new language and new behaviors, etc. So she found herself worrying over lots of things. She ran some training. She didn’t deliver the training, but she made that happen. And some of the negative comments that came in from the feedback from the participants absolutely stuck, you know, stuck in her. And she couldn’t get rid of it at all. She couldn’t overcome it. So we worked together on her self doubt and disappointment and things like that, because her automatic first thought, her negative thought, was, I’m no good at this. I thought, you know, I thought I’d be all right, and I’m absolutely no good at it. I’m not qualified. I don’t have a PhD. Oh, this came up again. Yes, I’m not meant to be here because these guys know what they’re doing. I don’t live this life. So the first question is, what evidence did she have to support that thought? And is it fair, and is it useful? And she’d realized that a participant had said that there weren’t enough practical examples during the session, that the coffee was awful.
Sarah McLusky 25:42
People always complain about the food
Jenny Brady 25:46
Exactly. Yeah, how important, I don’t drink coffee buut I know how important it is and that Amina didn’t give that particular participant a step by step career plan that was bespoke to them. So we had a look at what evidence there was, right? Here’s the evidence. It’s this feedback. So then the next question is, what evidence do you have against that thought? What proves this wrong? And there were actually several participants at this particular training who said how wonderful it was to have the opportunity to talk to each other. They had really strong breaks in terms of time that was protected to just chat, and that they found actually, two people had come out with a collaboration that they previously would never have met, and it just wouldn’t have happened, etc, and that the sandwiches were wonderful. So, you know, catering won in the end, it was all right. And so then looking at these bits of evidence of what, what could be true? What? What actually proves this wrong? It’s now, what do we now think about what actually happened? And Amina was able to to look at this and think, Well, actually, there’s more evidence to prove that this was useful to the majority. I can look at the practical examples that I can review these suggestions and put that in place, because it’s reasonable in this context to to offer that. What’s not reasonable is that one person out of 30, the room was full, which is a joy, as we know, and one person out of 30 wanted very specific, bespoke, tailored advice just for them, which is just unreasonable. So I won’t focus on that was her thought, and I can move from that. So she was also able to recognize where her expertise as a brand new person in the department had really won. And, you know, people were delighted that somebody else was doing this really tricky thing of getting researchers in one place at one time, and it worked well for the majority. So she was able to shift her self criticism over to something much more constructive that she could do and that she could reassure herself with. I learned some stuff here. I could next time I can do this. So it’s much more about forward thinking, rather than breaking your brain over something that’s just happened and that that’s where you become stuck. So it’s about evidence. That’s the first thing to really look at. But one of my favorite things to do, which is much quicker, is to name it and reframe it, which is a coachy term for if you find yourself saying things like, Well, I’m not as smart as everybody else here in my team, or in the department, or in the university, or in life, you know, let’s break let’s look at it. Because human beings, we work in all sorts of different places and things, and it’s much more. That’s the naming it, that’s what I’m saying to myself. And the reframe is much more about everybody learns at a different pace. So, you know, I was selected for this job or for this PhD program, or for this team leader role, because I bring these unique contributions, because no one else does it my way, and they notice that, and so the people who made the decisions recognize that as valuable. So it stops you from measuring weird stuff, and it stops you from measuring your own value and success against somebody else’s. And this massively helps you as an individual in terms of your own career decisions as well, irrespective of where you’re you’re placed. And then the final thing, and this is super quick, is to remove the word just anyone who’s worked with me previously will be going, Oh, she’s mentioning this again, but I’m a huge fan, particularly if you think about anything where you’re new in a role, and that could be PhD, you know, day one PhD. It could be as a researcher development manager. It could be a research adjacent role within a university or an institution where you’re you’re new to this, and everyone else is talking in a strange way and behaving and sort of, you’re looking around wondering what day it is. So you tell yourself, well, I’m just a student, or I’m, well, I’m just the new person, or I’m just on, you know, level one. And that kind of thing. Just it removes your agency, but it also removes your responsibility to get to know things more and to immerse yourself further in the appropriate places where you can actually contribute and be useful and valuable. So rather than I’m just a student, for example, I use this often. How about I’m an emerging expert in what did I say before flood waters in Nepal? You know? So rather than, well, it’s not my problem. I’m just we’re now saying, well, actually, no, I’m here, and this is what I know about this. Rather than I don’t know anything about that, or I don’t know enough about that, this is what I do know. So I can offer this, but I’m also really interested in finding out more, if that’s appropriate. If it isn’t, you don’t need to know more. Don’t don’t do that bit, because that’s an extra bit of work you don’t need to do, and you’re actually getting in the way, probably by getting involved in things that aren’t useful. So remove the just and become the I am. I am an emerging expert in so if you’re new to researcher development, you can say I am the researcher development manager. This is what I know about this. And maybe that’s enough, and if it isn’t, and you need to find out more, you can start to ask for help. And I think again, this comes back to the academic culture thing of, let’s make it easier to ask for help and to that’s what resilience is in my mind. It’s about saying, I don’t have everything. Can you help me? Or I don’t have have everything yet, but maybe I will. So these little words just yet, that kind of language is really important in terms of identity and saying, I’m here on merit, because someone noticed that I earned that place. Yeah, and academic communities and cultures are very competitive. It’s a hierarchical system um. So again, it comes back to what you measuring this against and the comparisons against the right things. So I worked, just as a quick example, I worked with some late stage PhD students who were interested in fellowships, and they were absolutely chinning themselves, as we say in the Northeast, about the people they were benchmarking themselves against, yeah, the experts. And they were, they were looking ahead, and that’s fair enough. We can be ambitious, but they were saying, I need to be there now, yeah, now, if I used to run a fellowship, if a PhD, or if anybody showed up to a fellowship as a fully rounded, fully completed you know, career professional, you’re in the wrong place. A fellowship is there for you to develop and learn. So benchmarking yourself against some, somebody that’s 20 steps ahead is pointless. So stop measuring the weird stuff and realize that, you know, you got to that point, and you got along your journey, and there’s no point in comparing it somebody else’s, because they might have 50 publications, but you went to 20 conferences and have the best network in the world, but they sat in a room and wrote all those publications. But in academia, we go publications, grants. How amazing, weird metrics, useful. I’m not discounting them. But there’s other stuff that is also just as valuable. So stop measuring the weird stuff. I think,
Jenny Brady 33:27
Yeah, some of the weird stuff. Another one that think that makes me think of as well is so many people think, Oh, I just need another qualification, yes. Or I need, you know, so maybe I need to do a PhD so that I fit in here, or maybe I need to do, you know, some specialist qualification in the area that they work in. And often that doesn’t help either, does it?
Jenny Brady 33:49
It really doesn’t. And one lovely example of that is because I quite often work with people who are commercializing their ideas, and there can be a sense of my idea isn’t going to change the world, it’s not sexy enough. It’s not life changing. It won’t make everybody sit up and notice. And you quite often see this in research niches, if it’s quite a specific thing. I mentioned carrots earlier. A colleague of mine did her PhD in carrots, which to the rest of us, really,
Sarah McLusky 34:21
I did a PhD on onions. So, I’m down for this yeah,
Jenny Brady 34:25
And so, so there can be this feeling of, you know, this thing I’m dedicating my life to will not be the next eureka moment. But imagine you one day, you wake up and you think I’m going to go and buy an E bike, so we’ll go environmentally friendly here. It’s not a car, it’s a bike, but it’s an electronic bike, and so it’s a it’s a big investment. I need to go and get some help. So you go to the showroom, you see the fancy bikes, and the sales people help you choose and it’s amazing. It’s. Beautiful, and you cycle off the forecourt and you’ve got your helmet on it, it’s all good, and the bike falls to pieces because the people who work in the workshop at the back who tighten the nuts didn’t show up that day. So suddenly, this big, beautiful thing that you’ve invested loads of time and money in and is wonderful is missing the key bit of the nut tightening, because those folks didn’t show up, because they thought, Well, I’m not important enough, because I’m not the designer of the beautiful bit of kit. And it’s the same principles. So I, you know, all hail nut tighteners, my favorite people, because they make the world go round. And I think, you know, research adjacent professionals are the same. Without them, stuff doesn’t happen as well. So it can be this, yeah, this sense of, Well, my stuff isn’t quite as important or or I’m meant to know all of these things about everything. Do your bit and do it really well and show up. Because without your bit, it all falls apart. And I think that that’s, you know, the nut tightness of the world are keeping us all all sorted.
Sarah McLusky 36:07
Yeah, I think that’s a fantastic little comment there to end it on. So thank you so much. That’s been, I’m sure will be incredibly useful for people listening and you do do coaching with people around this kind of stuff, don’t you? So if anybody wants to get in touch with you, what’s the where’s the best place to find you?
Jenny Brady 36:28
The best place at the minute is on LinkedIn. So it’s just my name, Jenny Brady, um, the website is coming. I think I said that last time that we spoke, Sarah
Sarah McLusky 36:37
Get there one day. 2025
Jenny Brady 36:40
I work with people one to one, and I also work with with groups and with teams as well. Imposter moments are a thing that shows up for so many different types of people, early stage, late stage, whatever. New to the job. You know, senior, everything, and with seniority often comes this sense of I’ve got so much to lose. So it’s a myth that it only happens to those who are new. Yeah, the further up you go, the more it is. So I’m there to help whoever needs the help, basically. So yeah, LinkedIn is a good place to come and find me.
Sarah McLusky 37:12
Brilliant, fantastic. Oh well, thank you so much again. Always lovely to chat, and thanks for sharing your wisdom.
Jenny Brady 37:19
Thank you, Sarah. It’s been really good fun.
Sarah McLusky 37:25
Thanks for listening to Research Adjacent. If you’re listening in a podcast app, please check your subscribed and then use the links in the episode description to find full show notes and follow the podcast on LinkedIn or Instagram. You can also find all the links and other episodes at www.researchadjacent.com. Research Adjacent is presented and produced by Sarah McLusky, and the theme music is by Lemon Music Studios on Pixabay. And you, yes you, get a big gold star for listening right to the end, see you next time.
