Toxic work environments and leadership

The unsupportive boss and destructive criticism.

Although the origin of the syndrome is often early, today's work environment can act as a potent fertilizer for these insecurities.

A toxic environment is characterized by leaders who are extremely critical and rarely offer positive reinforcement.

These bosses focus exclusively on mistakes, which for a person with a tendency to feel like an imposter, confirms their worst inner fears.

By internalizing this constant criticism, the employee does not think of the boss as demanding or unfair, but assumes that the criticism is a truthful reflection of his or her own incompetence.

In addition, these leaders are often unsupportive, not being available to guide or help, which forces the employee to work in isolation and increases the fear of asking for assistance.

Micromanagement and the erosion of trust

Micromanagement is pure poison for self-confidence. Toxic managers who over-supervise, constantly interrupt and control every detail of the job send an implicit message of total distrust.

For those who already feel like frauds, this perpetual surveillance is interpreted as confirmation that they are not capable of working autonomously.

This constant pressure forces the person into a state of hypervigilance and over-performance, desperately trying to demonstrate a competence that they feel is being questioned at every minute, accelerating the process towards professional burnout or depression.

Appropriation of merit and invisibilization

Another hallmark of toxic leadership that fuels the syndrome is the manipulation of recognition.

There are managers who systematically minimize their team's contribution in order to highlight their own to senior management.

This places the "imposter" in a painful paradox: on the one hand, he feels relief at not being in the spotlight (thus avoiding the risk of being "found out"), but on the other hand, this reinforces his belief that he does not deserve recognition or promotion.

If his ideas are rejected or appropriated by others, the individual internalizes this as proof that his contributions are worthless, rather than seeing it as an ethical failing on the part of his superior.

Summary

Today's work environments can enhance previous insecurities, especially under critical leaders who focus only on mistakes, thus validating the employee's worst internal fears about his or her own competence.

Micromanagement erodes self-confidence, as excessive control and constant supervision send an implicit message of distrust that forces the individual into a state of hypervigilance.

Bosses who appropriate the merits of others place the imposter in a paradox: they feel relief at not being seen, but internally confirm the belief that their contributions are worthless.