The Perfectionism Trap—The Devil Really Is in the Details

“Perfectionism” is a pair of tight shoes that look fabulous. “Good enough” is a pair of worn-in sneakers in which you move quickly and get work done. “Perfectionism” is the last screen of a triumphant game of Tetris, which you lost the whole day to attain. “Good enough” is an easy breezy game of frisbee that you play for pleasure.

The delicate balance between the pursuit of excellence and chasing perfection is hard to achieve. And perfectionism serves its devotees well—I know because I’m one of them. But when perfectionism is indiscriminate, it steals thoughtful time and must be curbed for efficiency.

If the perfectionist in question is you, it means you see the beauty and power in detail. Recognize that it’s an important trait to celebrate and also temper.

If you work with a perfectionist or two or three—and you are not one—you’ve likely been foiled in your attempts to talk them out of their infatuated trance. You may have tried to explain that Arial font and Arial Narrow font are typefaces that no one else can tell apart. But they just can’t hear you.

If you employ such a person, you may have been dismayed at the time they waste on micro-details—but you’ve failed to break them of the habit.

To learn to let go, we must begin with some educated empathy.

Perfectionists are driven by four main motives:

• A commitment to excellent output (the noble one).
• A need for control which calms anxiety (the primal one).
• The recreational joy of precision (the self-serving one).
• Unquestioned habit (the unconscious one).

As a result of these drivers, perfectionists like us have trouble seeing the time we’re wasting with our misguided standards. If only we could. Research shows that perfectionists experience 25 percent more stress at work and are 40 percent less engaged than their mellower counterparts.

Three Key Strategies to Curb Perfectionism

Here are a trio of tactics that can guide you and others toward moderation. Be cautious in a peer-to-peer relationship not to overstep. If you have the intimacy or permission that opens the door to direct feedback, walk on thorough. If not, share your comments generally.

Budget excellence: When is “good enough” good enough?

It can be fruitful to apply the mindset of budgeting money to your accounting of excellence. Imagine a small drawstring purse with gold coins in it, each representing a little bit of your excellence. Each coin is a finite resource. You decide which projects deserve a coin and which can be “good enough.”

Writing up morning meeting notes? Go for “good enough”—unless you’re sending those notes straight to your CEO. Building a sales pitch for a client? For this one, spend a coin of excellence. Did your partner mismatch your black socks with your slightly blacker socks? Don't you dare re-sort those balls of socks.

Use spotlight conversations to make priorities crystal clear.

Perfectionists commonly suffer from “excellence color blindness.” They can’t see the difference between tasks that are worth going the extra mile for and those that can easily fit in the “good enough” category. Help others see better by having spotlight conversations—explicit discussions that shine a light on projects worth perfecting.

Grouping tasks in threes is an easy way for the brain to organize. Select and repeatedly spotlight the top three items that deserve to be knocked out of the park. If you or your colleagues begin to assign other items a parallel level of perfection, gently shine that spotlight back on your top three.

Model restraint and show the way.

If you’re one of the lucky “Type B” individuals who gravitate naturally toward “good enough,” become a role model to others. Talk through your meeting points instead of building a complicated deck. Show a “good enough” agenda that’s clear but not overburdened. A voice of cool reason can go a long way toward leading others to more relaxed, reasonable standards.

It’s hard to step back from any behavior that feels as good as making the world a more perfect and dependable place. But helping yourself and your colleagues see the upsides and downsides of perfectionism can usher emotional benefits, increased engagement, and reclaimed time to all.

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Featured in Forbes and Fast Company, Juliet Funt is a renowned keynote speaker, tough-love advisor to the Fortune 500, and founder and CEO of WhiteSpace at Work, where she helps organizations like Spotify, National Geographic, Anthem, ESPN, Nike, and Wells Fargo liberate their talent and speed execution. Her first book, A Minute To Think (HarperCollins), is available for preorder.