When Perfectionism Becomes Your Leadership Bottleneck

As CEOs, founders, and senior executives of small and medium enterprises, your pursuit of excellence often drives value. But what happens when that pursuit becomes perfectionism — a paralyzing force that slows decisions, stifles innovation, and breeds burnout?

Perfectionism, in psychology, is a broad personality trait characterized by a person's concern with striving for flawlessness and perfection and is accompanied by critical self-evaluations and concerns regarding others' evaluations.

Perfectionism is something I see fairly often while coaching executives and senior leaders. More senior the role, often the larger the perceived risk of making a mistake or not getting it right. It’s a double-edged sword: on one side, it fuels your drive and high standards; on the other, it can undermine your agility and well-being. As Rebecca Knight points out in her Harvard Business Review article, managing perfectionism is about,

“harnessing the positives … while mitigating the negatives.”

Here’s a playbook for leaders who want to address perfectionism — not eliminate high standards, but channel them in healthier, more effective ways.

🔍 Reflective Questions

1. What’s the real cost? How is perfectionism affecting my speed of decision-making, my team’s willingness to experiment, and my energy?

   
   

2. Where is it coming from? Do I internalize overly high expectations (self-oriented), expect the same from others (other-oriented), or feel others expect perfection of me (socially prescribed)? (These are the three forms of perfectionism identified by psychologists Paul Hewitt & Gordon Flett.)

   
   

3. What if “good enough” is enough? In which areas of my work (or life) could I reframe “success” to mean “effective,” not “perfect”?

   
   

4. Who holds me accountable? Is there someone on my team or in my network I trust to call out perfectionistic patterns when they surface?

   
   

5. How do I treat myself when I miss the mark? Do I default to self-criticism, or can I practice self-compassion?

🛠 Exercises & Activities to Break the Perfectionism Cycle

1. Perfectionism Audit

   • Map out your typical tasks or projects and label them:

     1. Must be near-perfect,

     2. Should be good, and

     3. Good enough.

   • Identify which tasks truly demand high precision (e.g., regulatory compliance, finance) and which do not. This helps you allocate rigor more strategically—and reduce wasted effort.

     
     

2. Behavioral Experiment

   • Adapt techniques from clinical behavior therapy: intentionally do a task at “70–80%” of how you might usually do it.

   • Observe what happens: Is the output acceptable? Do others notice? What happens to your internal narrative?

     
     

3. Mindfulness & Self-Compassion Practices

   • Build micro-habits of self-kindness: as Ellen Hendriksen suggests on the IdeaCast, Dealing with Perfectionism, self-compassion can be as simple as lingering over your morning coffee, or forgiving yourself small errors.

   • Daily reflection prompt:

What did I try today even though I wasn’t sure it would be perfect?

4. Delegation Challenge

   • Assign a task to a team member without giving them detailed instructions.

   • Resist the urge to micromanage. Instead, ask for early feedback on a draft or interim result.

     
     

5. Feedback Partner

   • Ask a trusted colleague, coach, or board member to help you “spot perfectionism.” Give them permission to call out when you’re over-engineering or overthinking.

   • In return, offer to do the same for them — creating a safe space for constructive feedback.

✅ Action Steps — Your Leader’s Roadmap

1. Reframe Your Standards

   • Revisit your mental model of success. Use reframing language like “effective,” “iterate,” “learn,” rather than “perfect.”

   • This echoes themes from the article, Perfectionism Might Be Hurting You, on changing your relationship with achievement.

     
     

2. Build Psychological Safety

   • Promote a team culture where iteration matters more than perfection.

   • Celebrate “good first drafts” and learning moments.

   • Make room for calculated experiments—and failures.

     
     

3. Set Time Limits

   • Give yourself (and your team) hard deadlines.

   • When the time is up, deliver what you have. Move on.

     
     

4. Leverage External Support

   • Listen to the HBR IdeaCast episode Dealing with Perfectionism, where psychologist Ellen Hendriksen explains how self-criticism can alienate you and your team — and how to soften it while still holding high standards.

   • Consider coaching, mentoring, or therapy if perfectionism is deeply rooted or causing anxiety.

     
     

5. Track Progress

   Use simple metrics:

   • “How many decisions did I delay because I needed them to be perfect?” or

   • “How often did I resist delegating?”

   • Review weekly. Adjust your habits accordingly.

     
     

As a leader, your high standards can be a superpower. But when perfectionism becomes default, it can slow you down, exhaust your team, and damage your well-being. With executive coaching clients, we often start by building awareness and then focus on one or two aspects at a time such as practicing behavioral experiments, cultivating self-compassion, and creating feedback loops, to transform perfectionism from a liability into a disciplined asset.

“Perfectionism is a twenty-ton shield we lug around thinking it will protect us when, in fact, it’s the thing that’s really preventing us from taking flight.” — Brené Brown

If you’re ready to lead with excellence — not perfection — let’s chat.

At Agile Work Solutions, we help leaders build resilient, high-performing teams that value progress over perfection.

By Jerome Dickey, Agile Work Solutions