After working several years at the Acton Think Tank, Jordan J Ballor
summarises some important things he has learnt.
Over that time I’ve learned some important lessons about faith, life, and work.
His 5 points are
- Treat people like people.
- Your work matters to God.
- Culture matters.
- Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
- The dirtiest work has already been done.
They are all good points and he briefly expands on them. Item 4 is useful for perfectionists
There’s a saying in graduate school that the only good dissertation is a
done dissertation. The truth of this insight applies to other
endeavors, too. Let good enough be good enough. If you wait to “go live”
with something until it is perfect, it will never see the light of day.
Realize that improvement is a never-ending process, and that the only
way to achieve anything is to risk failure and even embarrassment.
Perfectionism can be a way of withdrawing from the responsibilities of
work in this world. So don’t let your high standards be an excuse to
wash your hands of genuine engagement.
There are things best done by perfectionists which need significant time devoted to them. But the perfectionist mentality can afflict all their tasks making them unnecessarily inefficient in areas that good enough will do. In other words, the admonishment is addressed to perfectionists, not those of a more sanguine disposition.
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