Fake It till you Make It

On a recent Friday night at the pub, conversation turned to “If you could do anything, what would it be?” Without a moment’s hesitation I replied “Act”. Surprised at both the speed and randomness of the answer, my friend probed a little further.

I was always envious of my younger brother, who moved schools after GCSE’s to attend a Performing Arts school. We had both joined Am-Dram groups outside of school, taken roles in plays, and both possessed an inclination towards the creative. For my brother, his creativity was more lucid whereas mine was more pragmatic [read “safe”]. While he was still “figuring it out” and finding his niche, expectation denoted that I would choose a more “academic” route.

WORDSMITH NUMBER-CRUNCHER

Fast forward a few years and I am a Financial Broadcaster interviewing banking bigwigs on any number of topics from private equity to the price of Gold. I spend my evenings desperately researching how likely the SNB are to raise the exchange rate floor from 1.20, and my days trying not to throw a blank when an interviewee mentions a term not covered by my Investopedia-sponsored home schooling.

But somewhere amidst this fear of being “found out”, I realised that I was acting to a certain degree.

1. Interview questions: CHECK
2. Big Girl high heels that remind my brain it’s show-time: CHECK
3. Entertaining financial anecdote: CHECK
4. Knowledge of high-yield derivatives trading: ..Sure!

ACT AS IF

This idea isn’t uncommon within the Journalism industry. Ever noticed how one journalist will adopt several prefixes to their “Journalist” title in one week?

But we all do it constantly. At that very important job interview, we pretend to be the person we think our prospective employer will want to hire. Once we get the job we then have to continue to be that person, at least until the probation period is over!

I’m not even saying it’s a bad thing. If we take active steps to imitate something for long enough then, ultimately, those steps will lead us closer to that “lead role”.

Until then, just keep acting Dahlings!