word “enough” doesn’t sit well with high-achievers. “But
I think it’s really speaking to the esteem and worthiness
of women. It’s part of our value system at Business Chicks
to be grateful for what you have while working for what
you want. So it’s not to say you can’t be ambitious and
you shouldn’t be seen to be better, but you also have
a baseline of being worthy and loved. It’s often we look
externally for validation and inspiration for success, but
if you do the inner work [you realise], you know what,
I’m bloody great to start with and anything on top of
that is a real bonus.”
While McKinney says he encounters more and more
clients, men and women, with all-or-nothing attributes –
“highly functioning, but paying a real price” – it’s women
who in some ways are more vulnerable. “As a society,
we’ve taught women to be incredibly harsh on themselves.
As they’re becoming more confident and entering areas
that are traditionally male, sometimes insecurity is
a powerful driver in terms of, ‘I have to work 20 times as
hard to show I’m just as good.’ If you couple that
with longstanding personal attributes of wanting to do an
outstanding job anyway, you have a powerful dynamic.”
In a way, the idea of “leaning in”, popularised by tech
exec and author Sheryl Sandberg, has created the perfect
storm. Women are being encouraged to take on gender
inequality in the workplace, pursue their ambitions and
step up to lead, but when it comes at the cost of our
wellbeing, is leaning out the only viable solution?
“I don’t think you ever really work anything out,” says
Isaacs, who believes every achiever at some point
struggles with perfectionism. “I don’t think there’s
actually anywhere to get to. It’s not a linear road to
balance – you’re going to get pulled in certain ways at
different times throughout your career, and with your
parenting. We send a message to young people, mainly
to women, that we need to have this perfect kind of
harmony with our work and our personal life and
that we’re less if we don’t – they think their work is
suffering when they’re with their family, if they’re with
their family they feel bad for not focusing on work. That’s
a kind of construct that restricts us.”
Interestingly, it was motherhood that allowed Isaacs to
loosen her grip. “Parenting just changes every single day.
Just when you think you’ve got this, your nanny resigns
and your kid gets sick and it’s just this constant
shapeshifting. It’s unlearning the perfectionism and
control, building your own personal resilience and saying,
‘Okay, I did my best, all good, no worries.’ I think women
need to develop that calmness.”While internationally celebrated fashion designer Karen Walker’s exacting
profession doesn’t allow for “good enough”, the business owner and mother
has her own way of maintaining equilibrium. “I’m very careful with
my scheduling, with the projects I take on or decline, with allowing time
for my own headspace and my family. And if that means there’s simply not
time to take on a project or to meet a proposed deadline, then the project or
deadline are declined. I’m not into taking on
insane amounts of stress or work. I’m into creating
work I’m proud of, that my customers and fans love,
having a team of people around me I respect and
enjoy working with, and not scrimping on family
and personal time.” Last year she was away from
home for work 97 nights, this year she’s been able
to cut that down to be closer to 80, and she plans to
reduce that again in 2017. All big work-related
decisions are also life decisions (her husband is
partner in the business), laid against the vision they
have for their personal lives.
Most importantly, failure is an option. “Of course,
I don’t like to fail. But it happens from time to time.
There’s no way around that. If you’ve given
something your all, you did the best you could,
made the decisions you felt were right at the time,
had the best team around you, etc, then you don’t
need to beat yourself up over failures. No project
ever starts out with a 100 per cent guarantee; there’s
always a chance of failure. The most important thing
is knowing what caused it so you can go into the
next project wiser.”
One of the big motivators for an all-or-nothing
individual is the threat of being judged by others,
says McKinney, which can result in abandonment of
a project to avoid the embarrassment associated with
producing an inferior outcome, or not trying in the
first place because of fear of not living up to (their
own) high standards. But Isaacs notes there are
cultural factors specific to Australia at play. “In the
US, where I now live, failure is revered; you go for
a job interview with Google and they want to know
what you’ve messed up. You do a capital raise and
they go, ‘Okay, tell me about your business failures.’
If you don’t have those they’re not really interested.
They love to fail. We couldn’t think of anything
worse [in Australia].”
Increasingly, certain companies, including
Google, have established initiatives to counter
perfectionism and increase quality by rewarding
staff for failure. It’s got me thinking about setting
some of the attainable goals and realistic outcomes
favoured by those achievement-oriented
personalities McKinney knows who’ve nailed the
“balance”. In the meantime, I’ll be adopting my own
motivational catchphrase: Just Ship It. q144 ELLE AUSTRALIA