Is it just me?: Wasn't I just lucky enough to get involved in this project?

There are moments when you suddenly realize how differently women and men tick. I recently had one in Berlin at the book launch of "A Different Kind of Power," the memoir by New Zealand's former Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern. Almost the entire hall was packed with enthusiastic women. Ardern is THE face of empathetic leadership. In short, she's pretty much the complete antithesis of the teenage "bros" currently in power. It feels like a very long time ago since heads of state like her, Finland's Sanna Marin, or Canada's Justin Trudeau were possible—even though the latter only resigned in March.

"They'll notice any moment that I'm not up to it."

In Berlin, she also spoke about her imposter syndrome, the phenomenon of doubting one's own abilities despite success and qualifications. Ardern is one of the few politicians to discuss such a topic publicly. In her book, she writes about how she was unable to answer a question about the key interest rate while on the campaign trail. The news only came out shortly before her appearance, so she couldn't prepare for it. But that didn't stop her from beating herself up for the rest of the day. She also generally didn't consider herself tough enough for the office of Prime Minister. I myself can remember once holding a "C"-level workshop: The room was full of top-level executives, from CMO to CEO, almost all of them men. All eyes were on me, because my job was to develop a strategy with them, but also to point out the weaknesses of their previous thinking.

Back then, I thought that the top bosses would realize at any moment that I wasn't really up to it. But that moment never came. Quite the opposite: After the project, someone approached me and said I hoped I knew I was really good at my job. It was praise I hadn't expected—and therefore couldn't even accept it. Wasn't I just an imposter who had gotten this project purely by luck?

Imposter or privileged?

When Jacinda Ardern spoke about her imposter syndrome, most of the women in the audience probably thought the same thing I did: "I feel you, Jacinda." Because who doesn't have those moments? Okay, apparently one of the two men present did. He asked a fellow journalist what this syndrome actually was. And that's when I realized: As a man, you don't necessarily have to deal with it.

Men are raised with a different sense of self-evidence. They're taught that they belong in management positions, that they're always sufficiently qualified in their field, that what they have to say is considered important, and that they don't have to prove themselves because of their gender. Not knowing a factual question? A given, and five minutes later, it's not worth a second thought. A very well-known German CEO recently revealed in a podcast that he had just learned the term "imposter syndrome" in a workshop. Fun fact: The man is 62.

Jacinda Ardern says there's a lot of strength in imposter syndrome. And if you dare to talk about it, you've already won. That helped me a lot—well, actually, that others talked about it. Especially my male colleague. Since then, I've developed a new strategy for my insecurities. The sentence is very simple; you can even repeat it after me: "Imposter... uh, what? Sorry, I don't know it. Do I have to know it?"

Brigitte

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