Why Medical Transcription Is An Ideal Career For Perfectionists?
What is perfectionism?
In simple words, perfectionism is that quality that drives a person to try his best and to make the effort to excel and surpass.
Wikipedia describes perfectionism this way:
Perfectionism, in psychology, is a belief that perfection can and should be attained. In its pathological form, perfectionism is a belief that work or output that is anything less than perfect is unacceptable. At such levels, this is considered an unhealthy belief, and psychologists typically refer to such individuals as maladaptive perfectionists.
Differentiate normal and neurotic perfectionists:
A normal perfectionist is a healthy striver who has his high standards but is willing to lower them a tad in extenuating circumstances. If circumstances prevent him from giving it the time and effort he would like, a normal perfectionist will scale down his ambitions and give it his best efforts within reason where as a neurotic perfectionist is never happy with his work at all. A neurotic perfectionist believes that mistakes must never be made, and strives and demands for 100% perfection in every aspect of work and life, and often expect just as much from himself as he does from other people. He does his best to be the best everywhere he is involved and never takes things lightly. A normal perfectionist bounces back from failure and disappointment quickly, take the mistakes in a constructive manner as an opportunity for learning where as a neurotic perfectionist becomes dysfunctionally depressed on experiencing failure and disappointment, conceiving the mistakes as evidence of unworthiness.
Why is extreme perfectionism bad for you?
An extreme perfectionist’s thoughts will be confined to making a job extremely perfect and not beyond that. Since his thought processes are narrow, his career growth will be restricted. He may spend more time on a job to make it of perfect quality but not on the quantity, hence a waste of time. Perfectionists turn into opportunists awaiting the ripe time to blow the iron hot, but they might not initiate that venture at all as the ripe time with all factors favoring them may not come at all. Most of a perfectionist’s initiatives will not be a team work but a one-man show as of artists like painters, actors and singers. Similarly, all the followers of a leader may not be doing their jobs perfectly hence a perfectionist can’t be a good leader.
How can be moderate perfectionism good for you?
Perfectionism is a healthy trait that drives you to perform at your best. Perfectionism is often the trait of highly “successful people.” However, the degree of perfectionism that you adopt matters much, as perfectionism is a double-edged sword. The more your thoughts revolve around perfectionism or the more you strive to be a concentrated perfectionist, the problem arises. Fanatic perfectionists can never fulfill their own expectations and are forever dissatisfied. Only a thin line of reality differentiates a normal perfectionist from a neurotic perfectionist. If you’re able to distinguish this thin line that differentiates a normal perfectionist from a neurotic perfectionist, then there is no chance for you to have a pause in your career graph at all, whichever field you are in. May be if you score an average of 50 in a perfectionist test, you are on the dot or the less or more on the scale, you need to remould or carve yourself a bit to be a moderate perfectionist.
Why medical transcription career is ideal for perfectionists?
Everybody has the traits of perfectionism but what matters is how much of it actually rules you. If it is more, it is bad for your overall growth but I say that is good for medical transcription career. As a medical transcriptionist you will be converting extremely sensitive health records from voice file to word file. To make the seriousness involved in medical transcription more clear, even a wrong apostrophe or a misplaced punctuation makes a lot of difference in medical transcription. There is no room for error here. The back end part of a medical transcription process too is a one-man show. The need of other actors like editors, quality analysts and proofers to interfere in your work only arises if your work is not a perfect job. So the more you strive for excellence here, the more qualitative the reports you churn out, and don’t worry if you have those excessive chronic perfectionist traits within you, we could divert it and use it for productive purposes and medical transcription career will be the ideal career choice for you even if you’re a chronic fanatic perfectionist.
PS:
The perfectionism test evaluates and puts my perfectionism score at 47 with the following comment:
According to this test, you have a touch of perfectionism. While this can be a healthy dose that keeps you trying your best, be careful that you don’t neglect giving yourself a pat on the back for ‘giving it your all’. There are certain limitations that need to be accepted, no matter the circumstances. Accomplishment and doing things well can feel good, as long as you don’t make happiness and fulfillment contingent upon them.
What I realized with my life is that the more I strive to get organized and try to be a moderate perfectionist, the more the successes.
- Pros And Cons of Medical Transcription Career
- Is Medical Transcription The Right Career Choice For Youngsters?
MT USED TO BE a great career for perfectionists, but now that pay is based on quantity rather than quality, an MT can hardly afford to be a perfectionist, the financial penalty is too great.
I agree that in the medical transcription business scenario, competition has become so intense nowadays with the work getting outsourced to offshore destinations that it has become survival of the fittest, but that doesn’t mean quality can be compromised, as any compromise on quality of the documents may need to pay a hefty price/compensation at a later stage. Imagine those medical transcription documents as your own data; handle the records as if you would handle yours. Both quality and quantity has to go hand on hand. The more efficient a medical transcriptionist in handling both these aspects efficiently, the more value and earnings potential for that MT either employed in a MTSO or as an independent contractor procuring orders directly from the clinics. Despite all the cons and outsourcing woes, medical transcription is still a stable, attractive career choice in these tough economic times.
It is true about quality and quantity. And that’s why I agree with you about MT can hardly afford to be perfectionist.
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