Impostor syndrome on the shop floor

Have you ever had a job where you felt like you were in over your head from Day One? That any minute you’d be publicly humiliated as the fraud you so obviously are? You’re convinced that sooner or later – probably sooner – someone else is bound to notice your incompetence and expose you to the rest of your team or organization.

We’ve all experienced ‘impostor syndrome,’ but we usually associate it with white-collar office jobs. Jobs that require skill and talent, yes, but perhaps more importantly, judgment. Making decisions is hard, and many of us have a tendency to second-guess the decisions we make in our respective professions.

Thankfully, most of us can make sound decisions most of the time because we have the necessary tools and resources. We can research the situation or problem at hand. We can consider our options carefully. We can ask for advice. On those rare occasions where a snap decision is required we have our past experience to help guide us. And when we do blow it, we have the trust of our colleagues who assume that we did our best and will learn from our experience.

I’ve worked several entry-level grunt jobs in my time, but it’s been a quarter-century since I last drew a paycheck as a wage-earning laborer. So perhaps it should come as no surprise that I have felt like a phony ever since I started at UPS. Sure, I looked the part well enough. But my entire time in the warehouse I’ve been waiting for someone to fire me.

As I mentioned in another post, the preload shift at UPS starts anywhere from 3:30 to 4:30 am, and lasts anywhere from 8 to 9 or even later. One day we weren’t done with preload until past 10:30 am. That was a long shift, with only a single ten-minute break.

While there are several other types of jobs in the warehouse during preload, most people load one or several package cars. On my first day my supervisor assigned me to load a single package car. He told me that I should soon expect to load two, then three or four cars at a time.

Loading two or more package cars simultaneously isn’t the same as loading just one. And not simply because you have more total packages to load. It isn’t the same because you have more – and faster – decisions to make.

Loading a single package car involves:

• looking along the moving conveyor belt;
• correctly identifying the 100 to 600 (or more) packages that are assigned to your package car;
• correctly transferring those packages – that is, according to the ‘8 Rules of Lifting and Lowering’ – from the belt to the car, and correctly arranging them in their numerical sequence on a set of shelves (or on the floor) so they’re ready for the driver to deliver.

It’s fairly straightforward and requires more physical than mental energy.

Loading even a second package car at the same time involves more mental energy than physical. It requires many more split-second decisions:

• Do I keep clearing the belt, because I know more packages are coming, or do I load this armful and come back?
• Do I load this package in this car first, or do I load that package in that car first? What about my larger packages – do I load them now or do I ‘stack them out’?
• Where do I put all of these many mail bags that I can’t stack out?
• Do I take the time to make room on an already-full shelf for yet another package, or do I just tuck it away elsewhere?

And on and on.

Dear reader, I have neither the talent, nor the experience, nor apparently the skill to make a good loader. I give it my very best. I cheerfully take on whatever assignment I receive. I never ask for but always accept help. But because I have trouble with the relentless barrage of split-second decisions, I’m always falling behind and then trying to catch up.

I’ve received numerous compliments from drivers about my ‘load quality.’ They appreciate the fact that I’m careful to make sure the packages are all clearly labeled and arranged in correct sequence. But at the end of each shift it’s not unusual for another loader, or even a driver, to help me finish loading the final packages on the multiple cars.

Needless to say I’ve moved around a lot. From one shift to the next, or even within a single shift, I can ‘float’ from one assignment to another. It’s especially during those times that I feel like I’m about to get shown the door.

Thankfully I recently floated to a different job entirely, that of ‘splitter.’ Splitters are responsible for correctly identifying which side of the belt a package belongs on, based on the particular package car it’s destined for. Like loading, splitting also requires split-second decision-making. But the complexity of decisions is considerably narrower.

I’m proud to report that I am an excellent splitter. The loaders on my belt have told me so. I do not feel like an impostor when I’m splitting.

Sometimes we just need to hang in there until we gain enough experience. Sometimes we need to try a different approach to the job. And sometimes we just need to try a different job altogether.

Learning the job is only one side of the equation. The other side is learning myself: What am I good at? What do I struggle with? Where are my blind spots? How can I improve?

An important part of both sides is figuring out where the fit between me and the job produces a ‘flow’ experience: having work that is challenging enough to engage me, but not so much as to overwhelm me. I believe that that sweet spot depends in large part on the number, variety, and rapidity of decisions the job entails.

Where is that sweet spot for you? Have you ever felt like an impostor? How do you deal with difficult decisions, and what about them makes them difficult? I invite you to share in the comment section below.