Design director Paul O'Brien: when imposter syndrome hits, does this mean you're in the wrong job?

Creative Boom: Insight Career Design director Paul O'Brien: when imposter syndrome hits, does this mean you're in the wrong job? A bad role nearly convinced him he couldn't design. What happened next changed everything. Written By: Tom May 23 April 2026 Paul O'Brien Every creative knows the feeling. You're putting in the work, but something isn't clicking. The ideas don't feel like yours. The feedback stings more than usual. A little voice starts to wonder whether you're actually any good. What's hard to see, in those moments, is whether the problem is you or simply where you are.

That's what happened to design director Paul O'Brien, and his story has a lot to teach anyone facing imposter syndrome today. In late 2020, Paul left a senior designer role at Ziggurat, a London brand packaging agency, to join supplements brand Bulk as creative lead. On paper, it made complete sense. He'd always been into health and fitness. The campaigns had serious reach, with names like Anthony Joshua and Katarina Johnson-Thompson attached to them. It felt like progress. But the reality was a mismatch between expectation and environment. "The role became heavily focused on e-commerce, digital ads and social templates," he explains.

"Important work, but not the kind of brand-building or system-led design that really drives me." Yet rather than identifying the problem as one of context, Paul turned it inward. "I internalised it. I genuinely started questioning whether I was any good at design. Imposter syndrome really took over that year: a low-level doubt that I realised had been chipping away at me for much longer than I'd realised." Leaving without a safety net Eventually, Paul left without another job lined up, which meant freelancing was less a choice and more a necessity.

"I needed to find out whether the problem was my ability or just the environment I was in," he explains. But the practical conditions couldn't have been worse. He barely had a network. His portfolio wasn't where he wanted it to be. LinkedIn had been an afterthought. But he posted anyway, announcing his availability... and the response knocked him sideways. "What shocked me most wasn't just the volume of messages," he explains. "It was who they were from. Agencies I'd only ever admired from a distance.

The kind of studios that felt out of reach when I was younger." Suddenly, Bulletproof, Design Bridge and Partners, Jones Knowles Ritchie and Taxi Studio were all in his inbox. The pace was relentless: new teams, new ways of working, the feeling of a first day every Monday. Underneath it all, the imposter syndrome didn't disappear; it just changed shape. "As a freelancer, every booking feels like an audition," Paul reflects. "If you have a bad day, you worry that's what people will remember. So I put a huge amount of pressure on myself to be 'on' all the time.

Every meeting, every presentation, every idea had to land." Despite the pressure, though, he stood his ground. "I didn't run from it. I let the doubt sit there, but I still showed up. Project by project, the work started to quieten that voice." When the work speaks for itself The project that shifted things was a brief for Byron Burgers at Taxi Studio, focused on driving Deliveroo sales post-COVID. Early on, O'Brien brought an idea to the table that didn't immediately land.

Article truncated for readability. Read the full piece →

The article addresses a significant issue in the creative industry—imposter syndrome—while providing insights on fostering supportive environments, making it relevant and impactful for brand strategy professionals.