Episode 55: Imposter Syndrome with Alani Bankhead

Have you experienced feelings of self-doubt or inadequacy, especially after a major life transition like starting graduate school or starting a new job? If so, you could have been experiencing imposter syndrome. Our guest, Alani Bankhead, a career supervisory special agent and professional coach, explains how to recognize imposter syndrome and provides advice and tools that young professionals can use to break the cycle of thoughts, emotions, and beliefs that feed imposter syndrome.

About the Guest

Alani Bankhead is a career supervisory special agent, professional coach, consultant, and public speaker. Alani has worked in federal and state government for almost two decades. During this time, she has hunted terrorists and spies in the Middle East on behalf of special operations and has served as a senior bodyguard to a top Pentagon official. She has ultimately found her passion protecting the most vulnerable — our children — from sexual exploitation. . Alani started the Air Force’s Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force mission almost 15 years ago in Japan. Since leaving active duty, she has overseen law enforcement investigations, and operations and hosted national law enforcement training in Latin America for the United States’ largest anti-slavery non-profit focusing on child rape and the commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC), also known as child sexual trafficking. Alani eventually moved to Hawaii, where she created and led the largest anti-child exploitation cyber operations in the Pacific comprised of federal, state, local, and military law enforcement agencies resulting in the arrest of almost 100 child sex abusers, the identification and recovery of 35+ live child victims, and a 96% conviction or plea rate. Still serving as a Lieutenant Colonel and Agent in the Air Force reserves, Alani currently works as a coach and consultant to enable larger groups of U.S. and international law enforcement, prosecutors, victim services, and judicial professionals to work together to achieve better results by crushing their imposter syndrome. Alani has given dozens of conference presentations and talks including a TEDx talk on how dogs are protecting children from sexual exploitation. She is also a best-selling author with her book “The Least of Us: How Your Imposter Syndrome Points To Your Greatest Power.”

Views expressed are personal and do not represent the views of GSSR or any other entity.