How managers can stop perfectionism slowing team progress

Jimmy: What's driving this perfectionism? You know, often it is a childhood experience or a moment in your early career where only the best was good enough. For me, as I say, it was going through military training. But for you, it might have been that moment where you only got praise from your parents if it was an A on your record sheet, or maybe you had to do the perfect recital in dance class, and unless you did, you got critiqued and that hurt you, so you wanted to be perfect. Welcome back to this week's episode of The High Performance Leader. The podcast for leaders working in complex, challenging environments to gain insights and ideas which help you increase your impact without burning out and to help you build a high performance culture in your team. I'm your host, Jimmy Burroughes. And if you're new to The High Performance Leader, make sure you subscribe or follow so you don't miss any of our upcoming episodes before you put down your device. Hello, and welcome to this week's episode. A little bit of a different episode this week because we're going to just be hanging out with me. And when I say that, what I mean is we're going to be going in these one-off or lone episodes a little bit deeper on certain topics. The reason being is that, you know, I have a lot of conversations with leaders on a weekly basis, often workshops of up to 50, 60 people, and there's a lot of amazing conversations that happen in those sessions that, often, I'll see a pattern or a theme that's starting to bubble up in multiple conversations or around multiple tables that I want to share with you. Now, we're not going to be going into those gruesome details of what's shared in the room, but we are going to be sharing some of the concepts that are spoken about and some of the ideas and insights that happen in the room for your benefit. And at the end of the day, what we're trying to do is to help you to be a better performer. You know, these episodes are an opportunity just to concentrate the conversation on something specific. And so, our first theme for The High Performance Leader lone episodes is going to be all around the power and the pain of perfectionism. Now, you may or may not have an opinion on perfectionism and what often what we see happen around the idea of perfectionism is that most people think it's generally a good thing, but it can have a bit of a dark side. Have you thought about the power and the impact of your perfectionism on others? Have you thought about the pain your perfectionism might be causing on others? Let's go a little bit deeper and talk about that today. And, you know, if I think back through my own career, er I guess I have been a perfectionist for a lot of my career, and probably still am at times. And I think it came up in my earliest role, which was as a British Army Officer. And as you may or may not have an opinion, the British Army is pretty focused on getting it right. You know, if you get it wrong in the military, as has been ah noticed on number of occasions and most recently in the happenings around Israel and and Gaza, if you get it wrong, then it can be pretty costly. And so, part of the training that you go through as a British Army Officer is to become almost perfect. Now, I don't mean that in an arrogant sense, but it means that they set really high standards. They demand the best. Everything has to be ironed exactly right. Everything has to be delivered precisely so. And when you're on the drill square, every movement has to be choreographed in time, perfectly, with all of those people around you. And like many others, I think I picked up many of those habits of perfectionism having gone through military training, having then been an army officer for a while where the stakes to get it wrong are too high, and we'll come back to that. But I took those tendencies into a civilian career and, you know, that pushing to be perfect, that perfectionism in everything you do can be a really good thing. It can lead to Certainly, if you're an individual contributor, it can lead to achieving great things. It can lead to you manifesting the results that you want, because if you're perfect, then, generally, there's no mistakes. If you're perfect, the standards are high, and in the workplace, those things get recognized. And so, most people, when they're going through the individual contributor part of their career, that perfectionism is reinforced for them. If they do perfectly, then that creates the results they want: promotions, recognition, reward, whatever that might be. Also, if you're perfect, you tend to be detail oriented. You tend to be right down in the minutiae getting to grips with all of the little facets of what might make things work or not work, and solving problems by getting to the crux of stuff because you're needing to be perfect. And often, you can be the inspiration in your team because if you're perfect, then people aspire to be like you. The challenge, of course, with perfectionism is that often people continue that momentum into their leadership careers. For how many of you have carried your perfectionism through your management and leadership careers and maybe have realized that it's not serving you? Maybe it's too much of a good thing? And so where I want to talk about the idea of perfectionism today is the pain that it can cause on you or on others. And this initially Let's start with you. Most of you know that I love the topic of burn out. And what we often see is that the people who are most frequently burning out are those people who push themselves the hardest, and the people who push themselves the hardest are the ones who, generally, are perfectionists. They're seeking that high standard, they're seeking the results and the goals and aspirations that they had previously, but they're pushing almost swimming against the tide. And so that perfectionism, "I can't get it wrong. I mustn't get it wrong. I can't make a mistake" is the thing that keeps pushing and pushing them towards burn out. Equally, there is a sense that if they drop the ball, if they make a mistake, then it could be catastrophic for their careers. You know, people have always expected them to be perfect. They maybe haven't made mistakes previously. And if you're somebody who is constantly being perfect, then the challenge that I would like you to think about is maybe you haven't tried risky enough things, because often when we are a perfectionist, we want to make sure that we don't push too far, don't take too big a risk or too big a leap because that might lead to a mistake. So we tend to play it safe. We have a model in our practice called the curiosity curve where we talk about people have to be certain or cautious or curious or careless. And if they push too far into carelessness, that's a fear for a lot of perfectionists. So they tend to stay down the other end of the scale, which is in that certainty or caution, and they don't take too many risks. So maybe if you're a perfectionist, you haven't actually expressed or stressed yourself as much as you possibly could. Equally, if you're a perfectionist, maybe you're overstressing yourself by trying to do everything perfectly, which is the second piece of perfectionism. You know, one of the things that we see often is those people who burn out, who have high perfectionist status, is they have very high performance anxiety. Maybe that perfectionism is being positively reinforced, but it's driven by a fear of something. Is it fear of not being good enough? Is it fear of being found out? Is it fear of if I make a mistake I'll get fired, of losing my my reputation, of losing my income, of losing my security? It's a scarcity tendency that comes out. And we talked about this in in chapter two of the book, but it's that move from wanting to be perfect for good reasons to not wanting to make a mistake because we're scared of the bad reasons. And something to keep in mind is that that will also overflow into your teams. Hey, Jimmy here. Just wanted to drop in to this episode and let you know that we're so grateful for all of those reviews that you as listeners leave on our podcast. We put our hearts and souls into the podcast, and the guests we invite are absolutely fantastic. Today, I wanted to share one review with you from a recent episode from Kelly: "Jimmy's experience and thoughtful dialogue provide a phenomenal canvas of learning opportunities from thought leaders in the industry. It was a pleasure both listening and participating. What a great resource to learn valuable tips and tricks to navigating impactful leadership capabilities." So, not only are we thrilled to have incredible guests on the show, but we're also absolutely overjoyed that it's having a positive impact on our listeners like you on the Ways of Working podcast. Speak soon. So then let's talk about ah the impact that it can have on some other people in your world. Maybe those people who work with you. You know, I worked for a leader for a while, and I still work alongside these leaders all the time. I see them in the workplace, and they are perfectionists. Everything their team brings them, they correct or improve, or change. The red pen gets applied, and yes, you know, maybe it is lifting the standard that that individual member of the team has produced, and the output will potentially be better. Equally, what's the impact that your constant correction and constant perfectionism has on that individual? Equally, if you are saying things like, "We can't afford to make mistakes. It has to be perfect." What type of emotions and feelings do you think that stoking up in those people who work for you? What we see is it becomes a culture of fear, a culture of compliance. And actually, the imagination and curiosity of those people who work with you starts to dwindle off. You know, if I was to produce a piece of work and every time I took it to my boss, they changed it and corrected it, and so never felt like what I was doing was right, why would I continue to give my best effort? Why would I continue to push? Or would I just become a compliant, "I'll do the bare minimum, because I know you're going to change it anyway." So your perfectionism now has caused me to become less engaged. But you as the leader, who is perfectionist, still feels the need to be perfect. So they're going to keep doing the extra work, and keep doing the extra work, which can then lead to you becoming more fatigued and more tired out. Equally, that fear of getting it wrong could create a fear culture in the team. You may end up in a situation where people are too scared to do things, or are unable to start things. They procrastinate because they're worried about the impact that it's going to have when they show it to you and you tell them it's not perfect. You lift the bar, you change something, you decide to alter or red pen their results. And so that means that you might actually be missing out on the opportunities to get the best out of your team, to get the best from them, get their maximum effort, and to get their maximum engagement. You know, most people leave their jobs because they're going on looking for a new opportunity. And if you're the perfectionist leader who thinks you're encouraging and pushing your team to be successful, but actually are taking all the successes away from them because they're not learning and growing, they're going to go somewhere else. So, what's driving this perfectionism? You know, often it is a childhood experience or a moment in your early career where only the best was good enough. For me, as I say, it was going through military training. But for you, it might have been that moment where you only got praise from your parents if it was an A on your record sheet, or maybe you had to do the perfect recital in dance class, and unless you did, you got critiqued and that hurt you, so you wanted to be perfect. Equally, it could be that you recognise that only perfect people got promoted, only perfect people got advanced. So that reinforced the model in your mind. But just like many things that work well early in your career, as you reach more senior levels, you need to ask yourself the question: "Perfect for who?" and "Why am I trying to be perfect here?" You know, the "perfect for who" is something that we often challenge perfectionists with in a coaching conversation or a coaching environment, where we say, "Well, perfect for who? Is it perfect for you? Perfect for the recipient of that item? Perfect for the person who's done it?" Because each of those three perspectives of perfect might be different. Your perfect might be 50% good enough for the next person who receives it, or it might be 200% good enough. Now, if it's 50% good enough, then your sense of perfection maybe is misaligned and you haven't spent the time really understanding what your client wants, what your customer wants, what the person who's taking your thing wants. If your product is 200% perfect, i.e., better than perfect, it's more than what they needed, it's over the top, then maybe you and your team have invested more energy than necessary, more resources than necessary in producing that perfect outcome. And that's taking you off other tasks. Maybe that's taking you off time with your family, time with your loved ones, doing hobbies, or, in a work context, working on some of those other strategic projects that are critical, but you never get to them because you're busy being perfect on some of these other tasks. So, worth paying attention to: perfect for who? Then there's the idea of the constantly correcting my team and how do I overcome that. And, you know, I had a great conversation with a senior leader in uh a an organisation a couple of weeks back, and he brought up this exact thing. He said, "My team put on this incredible incredible seminar and they did a lot of things really well, but the only things I picked up were the negatives. And so I walked in and I said, you know, 'Good job, but here's all the things I saw that we could have done better.'" And what was the impact on that team? Well, they were really deflated. And that leader, trying to be perfect, trying to raise the bar, trying to improve the standards, actually completely undermined and disengaged his team. And the results was a couple of the team actually decided to move on cuz they'd put their heart and soul into this, and the reality was that my client's next leader up, his his boss, was super, super happy and they'd give them lots of positive feedback and lots of praise. So there was then a disconnect between the perfectionist leader and their boss and their team, and that caused a bit of friction which that leader couldn't manage. So instead of being the critic because of your perfectionism, maybe be curious. If you can see that it's not perfect in your eyes, be curious as to how the team or the person who's delivered that piece of work to you ended up there, and be curious what they thought about, and what they might not have thought about, and turn this criticality or this perfectionism into a coaching opportunity. Because, again, if you take over and you do all the work for them, they'll switch off, they'll disengage, they'll become unhappy with the fact that everything gets red penned. If you coach them to learn and grow, yes, they might not be perfect initially, but they are going to get momentum and learning and growth from your coaching, ideally. And if you're a perfectionist, you're going to want to be a great coach, then they're going to help pick up momentum and they'll gradually get closer and closer and closer to the level and the standards that you expect from those people around you. The other thing is really try and celebrate when there is a perfect moment, and learn from your errors when you do get it wrong. And, as I say, if you're not getting it wrong, chances are you're not trying hard enough, you're not being risky enough, you're not taking enough experimental or curious moments. So dig a little bit deeper into the curiosity part and go around the topic looking for, "It would be perfect if we did this, but what if we were to try something a little bit more risky? Then how would we make it perfect? Or then how could we take it to the next level? And if we don't get it to that next level, what can we learn to improve for next time?" Because the fragility of many perfectionists based on that imposter syndrome, based on that fear of failure, is that if it does go wrong, is that they can sometimes crumble, it can undermine their confidence, they can fall apart. So, just in conclusion today, we've talked a little bit about the power and the pain of perfectionism. Perfectionism is not a bad thing, but too much of a good thing can also be dangerous. So I'll leave it with you there. Please let us know in the comments if there's any other topics that you would like us to talk to. We've got a whole season of exciting deep dives lined up, but I'd be really interested if there's something you want us to deep dive on, how we can bring that to life and how we can serve this audience best. Speak to you soon. That's it for this week's episode of The High Performance Leader. If you enjoyed this episode, please drop a review on whichever platform you listened on. We really appreciate it, and it helps us to connect with new listeners. Also, if you haven't already, head to jimmyburroughes.com and download a copy of my latest best seller, Beat Burnout, Ignite Performance. It's the leader's playbook for building a high-performance culture, and is packed with practical action tips to get you started. Stay tuned for next week's episode of game-changing insights and ideas on The High Performance Leader.