Perfectionism and ADHD in the Workplace

Perfectionism in the Workplace

Perfectionism in the workplace can show up in odd and unexpected ways. Some may be thinking, “What is the problem with this? People who tend toward perfectionism turn out work that is such a high standard that it’s near perfect right? So if I try to turn out perfect work, the end result is that my work will be better quality – right?” This is the thinking of how it might be but it isn’t the reality of how it shows up. A person with ADHD and perfectionism may find that they are behind on work, missing deadlines and often not getting all the work required completed. Sometimes the quality of the work being done may be far from high quality; it may be low or of unacceptable quality. These situations may arise from perfectionism; so let’s take a deeper look.

Perfectionism from a workplace point of view may show up with the desire to be error free and produce excellent work however what usually underlies these desires is the fear of mistakes, acceptance by others or a fear of being negatively judged by others. One may, under self imposed stress, have difficulty starting a task or knowing what to do first because nothing seems quite good enough. One may have many false starts (starting a project and discarding the work) or starting it over and over again thereby running out of time and being rushed at the last moment to get something in that may result in an unacceptable quality of work. Perhaps there are 10 critical tasks that need to be done and one completes only two or three, although they are of exceptional quality, time and resources have been misallocated. Do any of these scenarios’s sound like your situation? You are not alone. Many have this perfectionism trait both with and without ADHD present.

I think that the best examples I have heard regarding this is a story of two graduate students. One was a perfectionist and the other strove to write well enough for the task at hand and within the time allotment. They were both writing articles to be published in journals regarding their studies. The perfectionist ended the year with one well written article while the other student wrote numerous articles in that same amount of time that were good enough for publication. The student with the most published articles was approached by a book publisher. He was given an advance because he was viewed as the top expert in his field. The perfectionist was not made an offer.

So perfectionism is not anything to be desired or sought after but rather it’s something to be let go so in the mix of things one is able to freely discern what tasks need to be done in a good enough fashion and what are the handful of things that need to be done to an exemplary level of quality. The reality is in the human realm of work and productivity, perfectionism is only an ideal that is not attainable in human reality.