Rejecting perfectionism, embracing growth
For any Ted Lasso fans out there you will be familiar with the scene in the last episode on change and perfection. My favourite quote from that scene is from Higgins when he said, “Human beings are never going to be perfect. The best we can do is keep asking for help and accepting it when you can. And, if you keep on doing that, you’ll always be moving towards better.”
Perfectionism is unfortunately more common than we realise and resides in many of us. Including me. Yes, it happens to the best of us and it can get inside our heads.
Wisdom is always the great leveller though and I have been fortunate enough recently to meet a wonderful woman through my community choir who has held many senior level roles in her 78 years. She has an Order of Australia, was the CEO of the Mater Hospital in Sydney and was the first private hospital CEO in Australia to introduce maternity leave for employees - so you could say she is very accomplished. Over the weekend we were driving together to our choir performance. We spoke about leadership and with leadership, in our efforts to be the best leader for our people we can possibly be, how perfectionism can creep into the subconscious. And, it was at that moment, I asked her for help to get out of my head.
I told her how, at times I find it hard as I get stuck in my own head over whether I am doing leadership right, whether my style and personality is up to the task and whether my team feel valued enough? She said to me, "at the end of the day as long as you are listening to your people and responding the best that you possibly can given the circumstances you are in and being transparent in doing so, that is good leadership." It may not always be the popular outcome, but it will be the right one. There is no such thing as perfect and there is certainly not a perfect leader - but one leads with passion, empathy and balances their intellect with their intuition while being honest about their vulnerabilities and growth areas is actually what people need and want. And by doing so we do three things:
We grow
We better support our people to grow and
We teach the next generation of leaders how to grow
And we do it our own way, just like Ted Lasso did!
