As a freelancer and small business owner, it’s only natural that you’ll want to produce your best work, maintain high standards and provide a top-quality service for your clients. In this case, perfectionism might seem a helpful virtue, but what if it’s actually hindering your business and causing unnecessary stress?
Here are 3 ways perfectionism might be showing up in your freelance business and what to do about it.
You delay sending documentation
Following a discovery call or first contact with a potential new client, the next stage in the freelance-client journey is usually putting together your freelance proposal, which typically includes your payment terms and conditions, and a written agreement, etc.
This is an important part of the client onboarding process, as what you state at the outset will impact how the project progresses, help manage expectations on both sides, and determine how and when you will get paid. Naturally, you’ll want to get this right. However, you’ll also want to be prompt.
So if you find yourself poring over every tiny detail and going back and forth, making minor amendments that have little consequence on the outcome and result in a delay, then you can be sure perfectionism is at play.
The issue here is that while you’re sweating the small stuff, wanting everything to be perfect, your potential client might receive a proposal from another, more ‘prompt, not perfect’ freelancer who gets the gig.
To help mitigate this from happening, it is helpful to have a standard, customizable proposal template in place that you can use for all clients going forward. This will help speed up the process, especially if you set yourself a time frame to populate the template and don’t go over the allotted duration.
There are online meeting and proposal tools available that further streamline this process and provide attractive templates to which you can add your logo and brand colors. Another way to ensure you don’t let perfectionism suck up your time is to tell the client when they can expect to hear from you, and stick to this date.
Being prompt and clear helps build trust from the get-go and can go a long way towards helping you win your new client.
You procrastinate over essential tasks
If you find yourself procrastinating over small tasks, the other pernicious ‘P’ word could again be at play. Procrastination and perfectionism will inevitably lead to delays. They could even mean that you don’t get paid on time if, for example, you don’t send out your invoices when you should or have unpaid invoices that need chasing, but you are needlessly deliberating over the fine details of the draft chaser email!
To help mitigate this, it makes sense to automate or outsource repetitive tasks that need to be done but take up your time. This is where invoicing software can help.
Invoice Ninja is a leading free invoicing software for small business invoicing, fast online payments, tracking expenses and billable tasks. It also includes attractive, professional invoice template designs you can customize with your logo and brand colors. Again, templates to your rescue!
Another helpful feature is that with the Invoice Ninja Pro Plan, you can create custom email reminders based on the invoice date or invoice due date. You can set them up to be sent automatically at the frequency and timing of your choice. You can set ‘First, Second, Third’ or ‘Endless’ reminders to ensure invoices are not overlooked and you get paid faster!
Try Invoice Ninja for free here.
You constantly overwork
There’s a saying that ‘done is better than perfect’.
If you are working all the hours chasing perfection and obsessing over details, then it could mean that other important tasks don’t get done, you aren’t having enough breaks, your work-life balance suffers, and it could even lead to freelancer burnout because you are pushing yourself too hard trying to meet impossible standards.
In addition to this, your fear of failure or not being perfect can ironically mean that you’re not reaching your full potential. You’re not falling forward and learning from your former shortcomings.
The antidote to this is action. Action beats perfection (another well-known saying).
So, send that email, stop over-editing your work, launch that product, and post that insight on LinkedIn. You’ll soon see how momentum builds and with that your brand visibility, not to mention your confidence.
That’s not to say you cannot go back and revise or improve on things. This can especially be the case with product launches that are often launched in beta mode just to get the first iteration out there.
To get the most from your imperfections, you first have to accept them and then reframe them into massive wins. You’ve got this!
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It’s important to remember that nobody’s perfect. And that’s okay! Clients aren’t expecting flawless perfection; they are seeking reliable, trustworthy, punctual freelancers who are a safe pair of hands and have the confidence and ability to get things done!
