Has idoba cracked the cure to imposter syndrome?

Authenticity cures imposter syndrome: Insights from idoba's CEO Sarah Coleman

When you speak at an event, it’s conventional practice to impress the crowd by rattling of a list of your accomplishments and awards. But guess what happens when you introduce yourself more holistically, more honesty, and with a lot more authenticity? 

idoba was proud to have our CEO Sarah Coleman speak at two International Women’s Day (IWD) events this week - the Women In Subsea Engineering (WISE) #DigitALL: Innovation and Technology for Gender Equality event and Sandfire’s International Women’s Day event. 

Instead of just celebrating the high points of her career and presenting a “polished professional” image, Sarah opted for authenticity and shared a personal perspective on the challenges she faces as a mother, President, and engineer navigating the daily juggle of work and family.  

Sarah spoke candidly about the challenges of balancing her duties as idoba’s CEO with her role as a mother to a teenage stepdaughter and two young kids who cry when she leaves for work because they just want their mum to take them to school. Sarah also spoke honestly about the internal pressure she puts on herself to constantly improve and be the best she can be, despite the constant nagging from her inner critic.  

"Whether you are a Mum, a Dad supporting a working Mum, a partner, a step Mum, want to be a Mum, don’t want to be a Mum, an engineer, a scientist, or simply want to be recognized for all the amazing work you do as an equal to your peers, you are doing an amazing job just by showing up every day, and you are good enough just as you are."   

Sarah's speech reminded us that we need to share more of the hard stuff and acknowledge it sometimes is tough, but if we navigate the challenges together we can create companies that are diverse and inclusive enough to solve even the toughest problems of tomorrow. 

We love Sarah for being and sharing her authentic self. As one of the event MCs summed up, Sarah’s words and her example “cured imposter syndrome for a room full of people”. 

At idoba, we embrace people for their authentic, messy, imperfect selves. Does this sound like you? Imagine the better future we could co-create together!