Resilience is the number one thing you need. Scrap perfectionism and replace it with resilience. It will give you the freedom to try things and remove the self doubt, because if all else fails, you know you can recover from any failure or challenge along your career.
High achieving women and resilience
As high achievers we don't like to f*ck up. It's not in our DNA. We want to smash it out the park every single time and will work hard to make that happen. But as I notice through working with clients you can't run at that rate forever, you just can't do stuff at all costs. For some, it can lead to chronic burnout and a risk averse approach to career decision making about new projects and opportunities. Simply because you don't want to disappoint people or get things wrong. It can also impact you personally as you prioritise doing a great job and everything else slides.
Fail fast
Failure is going to happen along your career, whether it is on a grand scale or not. So rather than be scared of trying something new, try it. It's about how you recover if all goes wrong and the speed at which you do it
Steps towards resilience
Have a pity party - feel sorry for yourself, but set a limited time to do it 30 mins or 5 days. It's up to you. Then, get over yourself! Harsh but true.
Stress reduction - find one or two techniques you can employ easily that can help bring down your stress levels a little. Simple breathing techniques have shown to have a positive effect on your nervous system. If you are in doubt - go for a 10 minute walk to remove the build up of your fight or flight response.
Urgency - Take responsibility where you need to and move on. But keep perspective along the way, you probably did lots of things right too so take note of one or two to keep this 'failure' in perspective. Understand how quickly you need to resolve the issue - it's time to be proactive.
Ask for help - don't struggle alone, ask for help along the way as you figure out the solution. Two heads are better than one.
Learn from it - without over analysing. Take away one key thing you can do differently next time.
The more you practice resilience, the more effective you will be and those you lead or support.
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