Overfunctioning
I’ve wrangled being a serial overfunctioner throughout my life.
What does that mean? Overfunctioning stems from the tendency to be a “fixer”, where we take on too much responsibility and wrangle things because we worry that no one else will.
Overfunctioning pulls us into a performance vortex where we become dependent on achievement for self-respect. It feeds perfectionism, creates a false sense of security over things we aren’t able to control, and leads us to taking on both the work and emotional burden of others. It’s a quick path into overdrive, potential burnout, and disempowering those around us.
The first time I realized my overfunctioning pattern was when I started managing a team. I was a passionate leader, so committed to our success – both as a team and the individuals who comprised it – whose tendency was to jump in, come up with solutions, and slay the dragons all of us were battling.
I arrived at a time when I was working extreme hours and traveling frequently, while scaling a geographically dispursed team. I was both energized and exhausted (leaning more toward the latter), working in a way that was neither healthy nor sustainable. I dropped a few balls and beat myself up about it. And I felt terrible about not being able to dedicate more time to my team. Wakeup call: it was time to embrace boundaries and delegation.
I realized my pattern of overfunctioning was working against both me and my team. By owning too much, I was hindering their development – rescuing them when they ran into roadblocks, providing more advice than coaching, and ultimately making them dependent on me. I decided to take steps to get more comfortable with not having my hands in everything; to let go of finding the best answer myself and create more space for new ideas.
This wasn’t easy (as you other fixers out there know). I started to track how I was spending my time and put rigor into prioritization. I looked at trade-offs, asking myself “If I take this on, what can I let go of?” I created a practice where I was able to get more comfortable with not jumping in with answers to support my team members in solutioning problems on their own.
I made progress (and continue to)!
What was the glue that helped bring it all together? I asked both my peers and team members to hold me accountable. It felt good to name a behavior I wanted to change and enlist support from those I both trusted -- and who would also benefit -- from me making this shift. The result was more trust across the team, an opportunity for people to step up and take ownership, and me being able to “get out of the weeds” and grow my larger skillset.
Are you overfunctioning? If your tendency to help to others has mushroomed into overextending yourself, I recommend a few steps:
Become your own anthropologist. Start to observe yourself, take note of your patterns, and where you might be working against yourself.
Question your inner soundtrack. Are you using words like “should” rather than “want” or “will”? Are you repeating statements that box you into arbitrary rules you’ve created for yourself? Is it time to re-evaluate and reframe thinking patterns that are no longer serving you?
Check your ego. What’s motivating you to jump in? What reward are you getting from doing a specific task directly instead of delegating it?
Get comfortable with saying no. Know and stand confidently in your priorities, creating boundaries around them (without exceptions). Don't respond immediately to a request: hit pause to give yourself time to think through what the rewards – or trade-offs – of you taking it on might be.
Moving away from overfunctioning doesn’t happen overnight. It’s when we understand its gravitational pull that we can start to build practices that create both space, freedom, and shared successes.
