269: The Perfection Loop & How to Counter It

Once again, I am pulling from the book “Leading with Emotional Intelligence” by Reldan Nadler.

In his book, Nadler talks about “The Perfection Loop” – the fact that success-driven people often set unrealistic goals that set them up for failure or frustration.

There are three reasons for setting unrealistic goals:

1.    The expectations are set without the benefit of critical thinking

2.    Once the unrealistic expectations are set, they aren’t revisited for their accuracy or realism

3.    The unrealistic expectations are adhered to as the Golden Rule

Six Stages of the Perfection Loop

1.    Perfection is set as an expectation

2.    Stress, pressure, and possibly procrastination going into the task

3.    A less-than-expected performance

4.    You are On Your Case, and on others’ cases

Here’s the link to the episode I did on Being On Your Side vs. Being On Your Case:

http://exclusivecareercoaching.com/posts/2023-03-29-266-self-confidence-being-on-your-side-vs-being-on-your-case

5.    You become less confident about yourself and your team

6.    You determine to do better next time

When you recognize that you are in a perfection loop, you can begin to see how unproductive it is, understand how you created the loop, and determine what you need to change to get different results.

Here are some indicators that you are in a perfection loop:

-Your “planning” is actually worrying

-Your “preparing” is actually avoiding

-Your “resting” is actually procrastinating

So how do we counter the perfection loop?

-Assess how realistic and attainable your expectations actually are – is your evaluation system faulty?

-Determine what resources, time, or other help you will need to get the task done.

-Assess where you currently are in the perfection loop and determine the first step you need to take to regain control.

-How can you view your evaluation of the outcomes of this activity so that it becomes a learning experience for next time?

-Who do you need to support you, and in what way(s)?

-Who can you ask to give you feedback when they see you stuck in the loop?

As a previous coach of mine would say, “Perfectionists are scared people.” What she meant was that, in their effort to be perfect, they were trying to manipulate other people’s opinion of them by doing “a great job.” When in fact you can’t change what other people think – no matter how good (or bad) a job you do. That’s on them.

Perfectionists are also afraid of backlash from putting an inferior product or result out in the world. My coach advocated for B- work, and I concur. It is better to get your work out into the world at a B-, than to not get it out into the world at all.

As I like to say, it’s not winning or losing. It’s winning or learning.

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