We were lucky to catch up with Brian Lee recently and have shared our conversation below.
Brian, first a big thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts and insights with us today. I’m sure many of our readers will benefit from your wisdom, and one of the areas where we think your insight might be most helpful is related to imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome is holding so many people back from reaching their true and highest potential and so we’d love to hear about your journey and how you overcame imposter syndrome.
No matter how much experience we have, imposter syndrome is something that everyone faces at some point throughout their career or personal life. It’s human nature to question if we’re qualified to not only be performing specific actions, but providing advice or guidance on it.
I constantly work to overcome imposter syndrome by putting myself in situations to consistently learn from every experience I have. I do my best to read 1-2 books per month and listen to podcasts but the best way to feel confident in what you’re doing is by actually doing it.
This doesn’t mean that every situation you put yourself in needs to result in success, in fact it’s extremely helpful to face failure throughout your career as those end up being some of the most helpful lessons. There’s a reason the term “Fail Fast” resonates across startups and entrepreneurs, but it’s only helpful if you actually extract valuable lessons from it otherwise you’re doomed to repeat the same mistakes.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
Last May myself and a small team of founders launched Gildre, an international membership community for innovators and leaders to elevate their entrepreneurial potential.
My co-founders and I saw a need for this after building our own respective startups and being involved in the VC landscape for the past few years. While there’s certainly no shortage of entrepreneurial ecosystems, many of them cater to small subsets of entrepreneurs.
Our Gildre members have helped us shape a community that supports the middle 98% of builders and founders, and those passionate about developing meaningful connections instead of trying to sell/pitch one another.
All it takes is one conversation/piece of advice to completely change the trajectory of how someone scales their company or career and we want to facilitate thousands of these interactions on a monthly basis. Being a lifelong learner is a mindset, and knowing you’re typically not the smartest person in the room helps individuals develop skills that might otherwise take years to develop.
In essence – we wanted to build a community with like-minded individuals that’s exclusive but not elitist.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
There are so many qualities that help founders succeed in their own regard, and each are specific to that founder’s personality.
Resilience is one of the most common I’ve seen across the hundreds of founders I’ve worked with. It’s almost an innate stubbornness that keeps the individual building even after facing insurmountable odds. That’s the only way they’ll be able to succeed through the countless objections and “no’s” that each entrepreneur faces throughout their journey.
The second most important trait is a willingness to learn and accept criticism. You need to be humble and accept that there are many people out there who know a lot more than you and have done it before. Willingness to accept help and learn from others is critical to advancing your company and personal growth.
I’d include a third but realistically it would just echo the two first points. You can have any combination of qualities and skills but unless they include resilience and adaptability you might find your entrepreneurial journey ending sooner than you’d like.
What do you do when you feel overwhelmed? Any advice or strategies?
Talk to someone. Talk to anyone – whether it’s about the things that are overwhelming you or something completely unrelated.
While it might seem counterproductive to not work on the things that are bogging you down, sometimes the best thing you can do is take a step back and clear your mind. If you’ve been beating your head against the wall for the past 12 hours trying to solve a problem, continuing down that path for another 2 hours likely isn’t going to help. At that point (or well before it) you need to bring someone else in to share their opinion or insight.
Whether it’s right or not – just hearing your problem out loud with a different viewpoint can make all the difference in how you approach a solution. That’s why it’s so important to have a mentor, advisor, coach, or anyone that understands what you’re going through and has had a similar experience.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.gildre.com/
- Instagram: brianclee_
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gildre
