Wow. Yesterday was the final live webinar for the first Overcoming Imposter Syndrome online course I co-facilitated as part of the Mindful Leadership for Women Programme and marks a personal milestone in an incredibly emotional and fulfilling journey.
Back in April myself and Sarah Durrant began discussing the idea of establishing a programme to offer support to women looking to develop their leadership. We recognised there was a real need for support for women in not just what they are doing but who they are being as leaders and future leaders. We spent a few weeks refining our own ideas about this vision and openly discussing them to see if we had a shared vision we both wanted to work with. We did, and after sharing our values and what we wanted for the programme we established a mission:
Our mission with the Mindful Leadership for Women programme is to enable women to take their place as wholehearted leaders, empowered by a shared understanding that true power lies not in our ability to control others, but in our ability to inspire them.
We then started to focus on what we saw as a priority and something we could turn our attention to first. We decided to work on developing an online course on Imposter Syndrome, something we both have experience with and have research and practices to share in relation to what helps us manage our Imposter Syndrome symptoms.
Over the next few months we dedicated a heck of a lot of time and energy to developing the course content, structure, and supporting materials. I won’t sugar coat it; it was a lot of hard work and alongside the long hours and numerous calls to support collaborative working it has thrown up personal challenges (some relating to Imposter Syndrome ironically!) and issues for myself and Sarah to deal with as we learn to work together. I’m incredibly proud that we have been able to model a mindful approach in this – we’ve been honest and respectful and not afraid to bring up issues as they arise, and though this hasn’t been easy at the time it’s proven beneficial in terms of enhancing our working relationship and strengthening our work. We’ve given each other regular constructive feedback on the things we love about the other person and the ways we’d love them to grow and develop (again not always easy but so incredibly valuable).
The course was fully booked and in early November we welcomed 12 incredible women to the course. Over the last month we’ve supported their learning via webinars, sharing resources and practices, reflective questions, and coaching. We loved it so much that we’re offering an additional optional coaching session for the group 🙂
The course exceeded my expectations and it has been an absolute privilege to work with, and support, such an inspirational group of mindful women leaders. We’ll be formally evaluating the course soon but in the meantime this comment from one participant at the end of the final webinar yesterday was incredibly pleasing to read:
Thank you both so much, this has been a wonderful experience, thought provoking, empowering, validating, rewarding, comforting!
We’ve had a number of people express an interest in participating in a future course and we’ve now set dates for the next Overcoming Imposter Syndrome Course which will be in February/March 2018. For further information see the Overcoming Imposter Syndrome course information page and to book your place go to the Overcoming Imposter Syndrome booking form.
I’m really looking forward to welcoming the next group to the course and am also looking forward to taking forward what we have learnt to further develop the Mindful Leadership for Women Programme. If you’re interested in keeping up to date on the programme, please subscribe to our Mindful Leadership for Women mailing list for regular newsletters.
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