Ask HN: Imposter Syndrome as Senior Engineer
4 phdllm 2 8/12/2025, 8:56:18 PM
I’ve been in the industry for around 8 years and technically senior for 3 of those but I don’t feel like it. I don’t feel like I am an authority on much of anything, I second guess myself on technical decisions I make all the time, and I’ve never really felt like I’ve had a mentor in my career that I’ve been able to learn the ropes for how to do this successfully, I just keep trying to learn and do my best.
I’m applying for jobs as a senior engineer and having people reach out to me for senior positions but in the back of my mind I am nervous to even apply for these because if I get through the interview and start working I just feel like I’m going to get in trouble for “faking it” or something. It doesn’t help that a lot of my career has been “full stack” work so I feel like my knowledge is an inch deep and an mile wide.
Confidence is something that has been hard to come by in my career and I think that’s a big part of where this issue comes from for me but it’s also only when I’ve been confident that I’ve gotten burned big time on a decision I made or something else. What can I do to convince myself that I’m someone that deserves the title?
Comments (2)
helpfulfrond · 1d ago
Everyone is just doing what they can. We're all human and make mistakes. If you are doing your best, there's nothing more to do, and no reason to feel bad.
abhishekpandey · 1d ago
Please reflect on your work. Have you done deep work or is it mostly job hopping and somehow delivering few projects here and there?
You will be your best judge. Some people are shallow inside but very confident inside; others are pretty strong internally but never feel confident, and so on. If you are someone who needs to have done real strong work, end to end, throughly to feel confident then do it. Study hard and work on side projects (starting from simple to complex) to gain more confidence. Compare yourself with your past self and not from others... Wish you good luck.