Category: 3. Business

Strategy includes 40 recommendations that will continue the United States’ position as an aviation powerhouse for the next 100 years

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy today unveiled the nation’s first ever Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) National Strategy setting an ambitious roadmap to accelerate American aviation innovation and transform our skies for the better.

The Strategy and accompanying action plan outline 40 recommendations to safely and efficiently support AAM operations. The Strategy will also help advance President Trump’s “America First” agenda—unleashing America’s economic strength and ensuring the U.S., and not our adversaries, remain a global leader in next-generation aviation.

“Since the Wright brothers first took flight in 1903, America has been at the forefront of aviation innovation. Today, we have a bold strategy to unlock the future of our skies and unleash this next chapter of aviation safely and efficiently,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy. “Advanced air mobility vehicles will benefit the American people – transforming how the flying public travels, how first responders jump into action and communities access healthcare, how businesses deliver goods, and how we defend our nation. I look forward to working together to make this dream a reality.”

What is AAM? 

AAM is a rapidly-emerging aerospace sector focused on safely and efficiently integrating highly automated aircraft into U.S. airspace. AAM is not a single technology but rather a range of innovations—particularly new aircraft types that typically operate below 5,000 feet—to transport people and packages more efficiently than ever before. Beyond aircraft, AAM requires a modern support system, including a skilled workforce, upgraded infrastructure, and clear regulatory frameworks.

Together, AAM has the potential to reshape how Americans live, work, and connect by enhancing rural and urban transportation, strengthening cargo operations, and advancing both medical and military transportation. By integrating automation, AAM should improve safety and efficiency and inspire the next generation of aviators.

Overview: 

The Strategy is organized around six key pillars (Airspace, Infrastructure, Security, Community Planning and Engagement, Workforce, and Automation) essential to building a strong AAM system. The Strategy sets forth 40 recommendations designed to establish a resilient foundation for national policy.

The Plan is designed to implement the Strategy recommendations to support the safe, secure, and coordinated introduction of AAM. The Plan gives high-level implementation action items across four distinct strategic action phases, referred to as LIFT. These phases will advance research, stakeholder engagement, policy development, and technical deployment.  

1. Leverage Existing Programs to Support Innovation and Begin Operations 
2. Initiate Engagement with Partners, Research and Development, and Smart Planning 
3. Forge New Policy and Models Responsive to Public Needs 
4. Transform the Aviation Ecosystem 

Today’s U.S. aviation industry and its workforce, from large manufacturing and commercial operations to robust general aviation, support $1.8 trillion in total economic activity and contribute 4 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product. The future of aviation will include AAM that can provide new levels of mobility, connectivity, and convenience for the transportation of people and cargo.

In June, President Trump issued the Executive Order “Unleashing American Drone Dominance” to enhance United States productivity, create high-skilled jobs, and reshape the future of aviation.

In 2022, Congress passed the Advanced Air Mobility Coordination and Leadership Act, recognizing the need for a whole-of-government approach to advance the Advanced Air Mobility ecosystem in the United States. This Act directed the Department to establish an Interagency Working Group to coordinate federal efforts related to AAM adoption and deployment and to develop both an AAM National Strategy and a Comprehensive Plan.  

Support for the AAM Strategy: 

“Today’s national strategy from the Department of Transportation marks a bold leap toward the future of aviation. From electric aircraft to AI-powered air traffic systems, this strategy reflects America’s commitment to lead in next-gen aerospace innovation,” said Federal Communications Commissioner  Chairman Brendan Carr. “I applaud Secretary Duffy and DOT for assembling an all-star team and am pleased that our talented FCC staff were able to contribute to this historic document. The FCC looks forward to continued collaboration with DOT to make this important vision a reality.” 

“Airports are grateful for the leadership of Secretary Duffy, along with the U.S. Department of Transportation and Federal Aviation Administration, in launching the Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) National Strategy and Comprehensive Plan,” said Kevin M. Burke, President & CEO of Airports Council International–North America. “Whether carrying passengers or cargo, eVTOLs and other highly automated aircraft will reshape how people and goods move around America. Airports are eager to engage with the Administration to identify the infrastructure needed to ensure safe and efficient AAM operations, as well as the funding mechanisms to support them. We look forward to playing a central role in advancing the nation’s AAM strategy.” 

“Today is a landmark moment for advanced air mobility. At Electra, we applaud the Administration’s visionary leadership in navigating the most significant shift in aviation in a generation,” said Marc Allen, CEO of Electra.aero, Inc. “Our nine-passenger EL9 Ultra Short aircraft, whose certification is proceeding under the Department of Transportation’s long-established Part 23 process, takes off and lands in just 150 feet. It opens the door to a new era of Direct Aviation, where people can fly from where they are to where they want to go. We’re excited to work alongside the Department and the Administration to strengthen America’s leadership in this critical industry.” 

“The future of aviation must be built in America. We welcome Secretary Duffy and the Department of Transportation’s leadership in advancing air taxis and are committed to bringing them into safe, real-world operation here in the U.S.,” said Adam Goldstein, Founder & CEO of Archer. 

“Global leadership in advanced air mobility will be held by those who build, certify, and deploy first,” said Kyle Clark, Founder & CEO of BETA Technologies. “This National strategy, which lays out a bold, long-term vision for the future of this industry, puts the U.S. on that path, and BETA’s products are positioned to help deliver it. This creates a clear pathway for us to continue producing American-made, next generation technology to support both the needs of civilian communities and the mobility needs of our troops.” 
 
“Advanced Air Mobility is the key to unlocking U.S. aviation leadership, addressing transportation and cargo gaps and supporting national security. The 2025 National AAM Strategy creates the roadmap for how the U.S. wins the autonomy race,” said Robert Rose, CEO & Co-Founder of Reliable Robotics. “FAA-certified aircraft autonomy will prevent the most common causes of aviation accidents, connect small towns and rural communities and provide transformational contested logistics capabilities to our warfighters. Reliable Robotics applauds President Trump’s Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy for his tireless work to advance United States leadership in AAM.” 

“On behalf of NBAA and the association’s Advanced Air Mobility Roundtable, I want to thank Congress for directing this plan, and the DOT for delivering a national strategy, coordinated across 25 federal agencies, that blazes a path forward for the safe integration of AAM into the national airspace system,” said Matt Byrd, Vice Chair of NBAA’s Board of Directors and President & CEO of Hillwood Aviation. 

“AUVSI commends Secretary Duffy for his leadership in keeping the United States at the forefront of aviation advancement and safety,” said Michael Robbins, President & CEO of AUVSI. “AUVSI looks forward to partnering with DOT, FAA, Congress, state and local governments, and industry to translate this strategy into action, accelerate innovation, and ensure the benefits of advanced air mobility and automation are realized for communities across the nation, and furthering U.S. leadership in advanced aviation.” 

“Today is a significant day for the Advanced Air Mobility sector. GAMA applauds all the hard and collaborative work from the AAM Interagency Working Group, led by DOT, to create and put forth this national strategy,” said James Viola, President & CEO of the General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA). “This strategy will ensure that the U.S. will be a global leader in AAM through the sector’s integration into the national airspace system with a focus on adapting and improving infrastructure; strengthening the aviation workforce; adapting and improving infrastructure; expanding security, safety and automation; and furthering community planning and engagement. The growth of the AAM sector will facilitate additional transportation options, create jobs, stimulate economic activity and competitiveness, and foster further advancement in aerospace technology.” 

“States are excited for the advent of Advanced Air Mobility operations and are working to position themselves to assist the FAA in integrating them into the system. We know that together with the federal government we have already invested in building thousands of airports across the nation in and around communities that are are well positioned to launch this exciting new technology,” said Greg Pecoraro, President & CEO of National Association of State Aviation Officials (NASAO). “States will be essential for AAM operations through many functions that draw on local and regional expertise, and we look forward to partnering with USDOT and the FAA in this effort.” 

“AUVSI commends Secretary Duffy for his leadership in keeping the United States at the forefront of aviation advancement and safety,” said Michael Robbins, President & CEO of AUVSI. “AUVSI looks forward to partnering with DOT, FAA, Congress, state and local governments, and industry to translate this strategy into action, accelerate innovation, and ensure the benefits of advanced air mobility and automation are realized for communities across the nation, and furthering U.S. leadership in advanced aviation.” 

“The promise of advanced air mobility will be a game-changer in communities all across the country,” said Todd Hauptli, CEO & President of AAAE. “Secretary Duffy today unveiled an ambitious vision for its future and we are ready to get to work with our partners in government and industry to work through implementation issues and accelerate its widespread adoption.” 

“Vertical Aviation International appreciates this Administration’s leadership in advancing American ingenuity, and we strongly support the National Strategy for Advanced Air Mobility, which provides a clear, coordinated vision for integrating new vertical aviation capabilities safely and responsibly,” said François Lassale, President & CEO of Vertical Aviation International. 

“The Advanced Air Mobility National Strategy represents an important milestone in aligning innovation with practical implementation,” said Curt Castagna, President & CEO of NATA. “AAM has the potential to serve as a catalyst for new aviation services and connections, extending aviation’s reach to more communities. We thank Secretary Duffy for his leadership and vision in advancing a coordinated national framework and for recognizing the importance of industry collaboration as these technologies move toward deployment. Realizing that potential will require thoughtful coordination across government and industry, with careful attention to infrastructure, energy, communications, and integration into existing airspace. Forward-looking regulatory and operational frameworks, supported by specialized expertise and operational experience, will be essential to balancing innovation with safety, scalability, and long-term success.” 

“The release of this National Strategy is a historic and pivotal moment for the entire AAM industry and for the future of U.S. aerospace leadership. For Wisk, the Strategy recognizes that autonomy is the key to unlocking the full potential of AAM,” said Sebastien Vigneron, CEO of Wisk. “Autonomy can enhance safety, facilitate scaling to meet public demand, and help reduce operational costs. This federal recognition aligns with our mission, and we’re eager to prove out our technologies.” 

ABU DHABI (December 17, 2025) – ADQ, an active sovereign investor focused on critical infrastructure and global supply chains and the Gates Foundation today announced a landmark partnership to accelerate the responsible and high-impact adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) and education technology (EdTech) to improve learning outcomes for children across sub-Saharan Africa. The announcement was made on the sidelines of Abu Dhabi Finance Week, during a visit by Bill Gates, chair of the Gates Foundation, to the UAE.

As education systems evolve, digital learning platforms, data technologies, and AI-enabled solutions are increasingly regarded as part of a nation’s essential infrastructure. Much like transport, energy, and logistics networks enable economic activity, these tools help build the human capital and technological readiness required for long-term competitiveness. By supporting this emerging dimension of educational infrastructure, ADQ is complementing its investments in physical and digital assets with capabilities that will help shape and sustain future economies.

By 2050, Africa will be home to one in every three of the world’s young people. Yet today, nine in ten children in the region are unable to read or do basic math by age 10. This partnership will direct resources toward solutions that reflect local needs, empower teachers, and support students, helping education systems build the capacity required for sustained and scalable progress. Strengthening early-grade literacy and numeracy is essential to improving learning outcomes throughout a child’s education and to supporting more growth across the region.

The four-year partnership will deploy a combined USD 40 million, with ADQ contributing up to USD 20 million, to tackle persistent education challenges across Sub-Saharan Africa by expanding the ethical use of AI through two flagship programs.

AI-for-Education, a global initiative launched in 2022, develops practical models of AI-enabled learning and provides expert guidance to governments in the Global South. The EdTech and AI Fund, a new multi-investor vehicle set to launch next year, will scale proven EdTech and AI solutions across sub-Saharan Africa. Jointly anchored by ADQ and the Gates Foundation, it will be the first fund dedicated to national-level expansion of interventions shown to improve foundational learning. Generative AI provides unique opportunities to enhance proven approaches such as structured pedagogy, but evidence on what works is scarce. The sector also faces underfunding and low reach. More than 93 percent of EdTech products in low and middle-income countries are not tested for proof-of-learning impact, only two percent of global EdTech venture capital is attracted by sub-Saharan Africa, and just four percent of children in the region consistently use EdTech.

Earlier this year, the Gates Foundation announced a USD 240 million expansion of its Global Education Program, a four-year effort to help 15 million children in sub-Saharan Africa and India learn more effectively by delivering cost-efficient and evidence-based solutions in partnership with governments. Building on this momentum, the UAE is applying its strengths in innovation and technical deployment to accelerate the integration and scaling of AI in education, contributing to the collective effort.

“As part of the UAE’s commitment to advancing AI and technology-enabled solutions, this partnership underscores ADQ’s dedication to delivering meaningful impact for current and future generations across global markets,” said His Excellency Mohamed Hassan Alsuwaidi, Managing Director and Group Chief Executive Officer of ADQ. “As a responsible investor, we have focused on enabling the infrastructure that supports socio-economic development and creating pathways for inclusive growth. While that has traditionally meant physical assets, the systems that support learning, data, and intelligent technologies are becoming equally important to national development. By combining our investment capabilities with the expertise of leading institutions, we aim to strengthen education systems, widen access to opportunity, and equip millions of young people across the African continent with the skills they need to thrive in an increasingly digital world.”

“AI has enormous potential to transform learning and expand opportunity. This partnership brings together the expertise needed to apply these tools responsibly and scale approaches already showing results,” said Bill Gates. “The UAE has shown leadership in using innovation to expand opportunity, and together we’ll build on that momentum to help children develop the foundational skills that shape their futures.”

With increasing momentum for education reform across Africa, reflected in commitments made at the 2025 African Union Summit to end learning poverty by 2035, the opportunity for meaningful progress has never been greater. Advances in technology, expanding local expertise, and increasing collaboration are creating a stronger foundation for change. By supporting efforts to apply AI and EdTech in ways that meet the needs of teachers and students, this partnership aims to help accelerate learning gains and contribute to a more prosperous and inclusive future for the continent’s young people.

About ADQ

Established in 2018, ADQ is an active sovereign investor with a focus on critical infrastructure and global supply chains. As a strategic partner to the Government of Abu Dhabi, ADQ invests in the growth of business platforms anchored in the Emirate that deliver value to local communities and long-term financial returns to its shareholders. ADQ’s total assets amounted to USD 263 billion as of June 30, 2025. Its rapidly expanding portfolio encompasses companies across numerous core sectors of the economy, including energy and utilities, transport and logistics, food and agriculture, healthcare and life sciences, financial services, infrastructure and critical minerals, and sustainable manufacturing.

For more information, visit adq.ae or write to [email protected].
You can also follow ADQ on Instagram, LinkedIn and X.

About the Gates Foundation

Guided by the belief that every life has equal value, the Gates Foundation works to help all people lead healthy, productive lives. In developing countries, we work with partners to create impactful solutions so that people can take charge of their futures and achieve their full potential. In the United States, we aim to ensure that everyone—especially those with the fewest resources—has access to the opportunities needed to succeed in school and life. Based in Seattle, Washington, the foundation is led by CEO Mark Suzman, under the direction of Bill Gates and our governing board.

Media contact: [email protected]

Canada experienced one of its largest drops in population in the most recent quarter, the result of a crackdown on international students. The drop marks dramatic turnaround for a country that has long pegged its economic growth to immigration.

New estimates released on Wednesday by Statistics Canada showed that Canada’s population fell by 0.2% in the third quarter to stand at 41.6 million, down from 41.65 million on 1 July.

It was the only other quarterly decline on record came in 2020, and was attributed to Covid-19 border restrictions.

The recent decline, however, is driven largely by a drop in the number of international students studying in Canada after Ottawa pledged to tamp down on the number of study permits issued.

Canada’s Liberal party, which oversaw record-levels of immigration under the tenure of former prime minister Justin Trudeau, has shifted course quickly after mounting pushback over what many saw as unsustainable migration.

In the third quarter of 2023, Canada’s quarterly population growth was the highest ever since 1957, with 420,000 people added to the country over that three-month span.

Non-permanent residents make up roughly 6.8% of the total population, down from 7.3% last quarter. The current prime minister Mark Carney has pledged to reduce the number of non-permanent residents in Canada to 5 per cent of the total population by the end of 2027.

Part of that plan involves cutting the number of international student permits in half, from a target of 305,900 new arrivals for 2025 to 155,000 in 2026, and 150,000 in each of 2027 and 2028. At the same time, the federal government plans to gently increase the number of permanent residents admitted into Canada compared with its previously announced immigration plan. It anticipates admitting 395,000 new permanent residents in 2025, 380,000 in 2026, and 365,000 in 2027.

The finance minister, François-Philippe Champagne, recently told reporters Canada had “exceeded our capacity to welcome” and provide services to immigrants in recent years.

Robert Kavcic, an economist at Bank of Montreal wrote in a note Wednesday that a “major population adjustment is well under way and it remains one of the biggest economic stories” in Canada.

“In order to hit the non-permanent resident target share, we’ll need to see population growth run barely above zero through 2028, before settling back into a longer-term run rate of just under 1%.”

“We’ve argued all along that the explosion in population growth – to nearly 1.3 million people within a year at one point – was playing a major role in many economic issues Canadian policymakers have been struggling to deal with,” he wrote adding he’s seen a “significant weakening” of the rental market, less pressure on services inflation and growth in real gross domestic product per capita are among the potential impacts he sees as a result of the decline.

The new figures show that every province and territory reported population decreases, apart from Alberta and Nunavut, both of which had increases of 0.2%.

Alexandria, VA (December 17, 2025) ― The National Credit Union Administration today released its third quarter state-level credit union data report for 2025. Report findings indicate that for federally insured credit unions, assets increased by 2.6 percent at the median over the year ending in the third quarter of 2025. At the same time, loans outstanding grew by 0.3 percent at the median, according to the latest Quarterly U.S. Map Review.

Nationally, the median ratio of total loans outstanding to total shares and deposits — the loan-to-share ratio — was 70 percent at the end of the third quarter of 2025.

Credit union membership continued to grow in the aggregate over the year ending in the third quarter of 2025. At the median, membership declined by 0.5 percent. Credit unions with falling membership tend to be small; over half had less than $50 million in assets in the third quarter of 2025. 

Countrywide, 88 percent of federally insured credit unions had positive year-to-date net income in the third quarter of 2025, compared with 85 percent in the third quarter of 2024.

The NCUA’s Quarterly U.S. Map Review tracks performance indicators for federally insured credit unions in all 50 states and the District of Columbia and includes information on two important state-level economic indicators: the unemployment rate and home prices.

December 17, 2025

The Honourable Evan Solomon, Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation and Minister responsible for the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario, will make an important announcement in support of the growth of York Region businesses. 

A media availability will follow the in-person announcement.

Please note that details are subject to change. All times are local.

Date: Thursday, December 18, 2025

Time: 10:15 a.m.

R.S.V.P: Media representatives wishing to attend this event must confirm their participation by sending their full name and the name of their organization to fdo.rsvp-rsvp.fdo@feddevontario.gc.ca. Details on how to attend will be provided afterward.

Jennifer Breheny Wallace: I shudder when I hear people bragging about perfectionism or saying perfectionism can be good; healthy striving, striving for excellence is good. Perfectionism? I just don’t see any good that comes of it.

Samantha Laine Perfas: Many people hold themselves to extremely high standards, but when the scales tip to the pursuit of perfection, it can result in anxiety, depression, and other serious mental health issues.

So how do we know when we’ve gone too far in trying to do our best?

Welcome to “Harvard Thinking,” a podcast where the life of the mind meets everyday life.

Today I’m joined by:

Michaela Kerrissey: I’m Michaela Kerrissey. I’m an associate professor of management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Laine Perfas: She studies how organizations and teams innovate and improve, and is also an alum of the Harvard Business School. Then:

Ellen Hendriksen: Ellen Hendriksen. I’m a clinical assistant professor at Boston University’s Center for Anxiety and Related Disorders.

Laine Perfas: She did post-doctoral work at Harvard Medical School and is the author of “How to Be Enough: Self-Acceptance for Self-Critics and Perfectionists.” And finally:

Wallace: Jennifer Wallace. I’m a journalist and author of two books: The first one was “Never Enough,” and the forthcoming, “Mattering: The Secret to Building a Life of Deep Connection and Purpose.”

Laine Perfas: She graduated from Harvard College in 1994.

And I’m Samantha Laine Perfas, your host and a writer for The Harvard Gazette. Today we’ll talk about perfectionism and the benefits of accepting when we’re less than perfect.

Ellen, in your book you argue perfectionism itself is an imperfect word or kind of a misnomer. Could you explain?

Hendriksen: Perfectionism is often thought of as a desire to be perfect, a striving to have no mistakes, no flaws. But in my clinical work, I’ve really found the opposite to be true. No one ever comes in and identifies as a perfectionist. Instead, people come in and say, “I feel like a failure. I feel like I’m falling behind. I feel like I am letting everybody down.” So the way it manifests in my experience is that it does come across as never feeling good enough.

“No one ever comes in and identifies as a perfectionist. Instead, people come in and say, ‘I feel like a failure.’”

Wallace: So the way I think about perfectionism is the belief that my self-worth is tied to being perfect, so that I only feel good about myself when I’m perfect. And when I fail or experience setbacks, then I feel like those failures are an indictment of my worth.

Kerrissey: What I really appreciate about both of these definitions is that they get this idea that in many ways, perfectionism is this mindset that we bring to the work that we’re doing and to how we feel about the work that we’re doing. I like that — as part of how we think about it — because it means that we also have a choice and that there’s some discretion that we can have. And that, I think, is freeing.

Laine Perfas: Perfectionism manifests in different ways for different people. What does it look like in reality, and why is it so prevalent?

Wallace: When we’re thinking about perfectionism, researchers who study it have looked at three kinds of perfectionism. So there’s the self-oriented perfectionism, which is requiring perfection of oneself. Then there’s other-oriented perfectionism, which is needing others to be perfect. And then there’s something called socially prescribed perfectionism. And that is believing that others require us to be perfect. And what Tom Curran, a researcher in the UK, has found is that over the last few decades, there has been a 33 percent rise in socially prescribed perfectionism. That is the idea that society is demanding of me to be perfect. And one of the things that I often say to young people when I talk to them, and I think it’s a useful exercise for all of us, is that the next time you feel like you’re not enough, whether it’s on your phone or watching something on Netflix or whatever it is, think for a second — who out there is profiting off of making me feel like I’m not enough? Whenever I say that to young people, they love the idea of the peek behind the capitalist curtain. There are people who are making a lot of money off of trying to convince us that we need to be perfect in order to be worthy.

“There are people who are making a lot of money off of trying to convince us that we need to be perfect in order to be worthy.”

Hendriksen: Yeah, perfectionism is one of those strange occurrences where it comes from within. There is definitely genetic research showing that perfectionism can be passed down. It can come from the way we were raised. We can come out of any family perfectionistic, but it’s been found that there are four sort of types of families: those are the snowplow helicopter parents; families where love is contingent upon performance; parents who are perfectionistic themselves; and then also sort of a chaotic, dramatic, erratic type of family where kids might double down on perfectionism as a sense of control. However, to Jennifer’s point, perfectionism not only comes from within; it can also come from all around us, from this capitalist environment that makes us feel like we have to perform and achieve and consume to ever higher levels, just to be sufficient as a person.

Kerrissey: Also these sets of experiences that we all have early in life, even outside of our family — in the classroom, in our first jobs that we get, our first internships — where we learn really quickly about a set of expectations that a group has about what performance looks like, what value looks like, and what it looks like to be enough and to be good. And in the research that I do, which is mostly focused in workplaces, one of the things that always strikes me every time is just how quickly people pick up on what those expectations and norms are. Within a few minutes, people get a sense of what it’s like around here to make a mistake, ask a question that somebody thinks you ought to have known the answer to. Those environments, even outside of the broad capitalist society, just these environments that we set in, groups that we form, are really strong and have a really large impact on how people feel about the consequences or the benefits of saying what’s on their mind, admitting a mistake. And I think that’s really powerful and palpable every day in every meeting we have, and we carry that with us.

Laine Perfas: Perfectionism can also be really dangerous. Could you talk about the negative ways we see it showing up?

Kerrissey: One of the things that we see in work teams is that teams where people are striving for perfectionism and it becomes the culture of the team, that it leads to burnout a lot sooner, and that we see people will have to quit their jobs and walk away from positions that would otherwise be really beneficial to them and probably important for their income. The costs in that respect are also quite high for people.

Hendriksen: In terms of diagnosable disorders, perfectionism is really at the heart of diverse diagnoses like social anxiety, like eating disorders, like OCD; we see it a lot in depression. We see it in a lot of treatment-resistant anxiety. And what connects all of those is if we drill down there and find a foundation of perfectionism, it is often based on a flawed perception. There’s a felt sense of inadequacy that keeps us separated from others. There’s this idea that we have to work very hard to avoid finding ourselves in a situation that would reveal that inadequacy to others. That can be a challenging belief to carry around.

Wallace: In my interviews with families, one of the unfortunate threads that I heard was that the high-achieving child was presenting as perfect until it was too late, until they died by suicide. And that is because they could not reach out for help. Perfectionism can get in the way of our relationships; it can get in the way of our mental health; it can get in the way of our lives. It is very serious. And I shudder when I hear people bragging about perfectionism or saying perfectionism can be good; healthy striving, striving for excellence is good perfectionism, I just don’t see any good that comes of it.

Laine Perfas: Jennifer, in your book “Never Enough” — which I love by the way — you talk about achievement pressure, and I think it can maybe come from well-meaning parents and teachers, but it can create turmoil within young people. Could you talk about that a little bit?

Wallace: I’m not anti-pressure, just to put it out there first. I believe in high achievement. I get a lot of joy from achieving. I want my kids to experience that joy. Where achievement becomes toxic is when our sense of self is so wrapped up in our achievements that we only feel good about ourselves when we achieve; and when we don’t, we can spiral. What I found in the research when I was looking at these high-achieving kids and looking at the achievement pressure that they were under, I went in search of the kids who were doing well, despite the pressure, to see what they had in common, and what I found to be the antidote to perfectionism is this idea of mattering. Mattering is not my idea. It’s been studied since the 1980s, but it is this feeling that I am valued for who I am deep at my core, away from my achievements, and importantly, that I am depended on to add meaningful value back at home, at school, in the wider world. And so the kids I met who were in these high-achieving environments, a high level of mattering acted as a kind of protective shield. It didn’t mean these kids didn’t experience setbacks and disappointments, but they weren’t an indictment of their worth.

“The antidote to perfectionism is this idea of mattering … this feeling that I am valued for who I am deep at my core, away from my achievements.”

Kerrissey: This distinction, Jennifer, that you bring up in that it’s not about setting goals aside or letting performance go, and the idea that we want to strive to achieve great things in our lives, that we can actually still do that even without perfectionism. In our research, we look at this concept of psychological safety, which is this idea that we set climates in groups and in organizations and in our lives around whether or not you can step forward, try something out that you don’t know how to do, admit a mistake, and that you won’t be punished or penalized or have it held against you. And that’s this kind of climate that we can create that’s psychologically safe, where people can take risks and still matter. One of the ways that it most often gets misinterpreted is that it means that we should prioritize comfort, being nice, having climates where you might not say what’s on your mind because you’re trying to protect how everybody feels. But there’s a real distinction to be made about comfort and the safety to try something out and to not have to be perfect all the time. What we’re really trying to do is not expand comfort zones, but to help all of us to spend more time and be more comfortable in that discomfort zone.

Hendriksen: The notion of not being anti-pressure or anti-achievement is really important because, at least clinically, sometimes the advice for people with perfectionism, it comes across as you have to lower your standards, and that can be really hard to hear for somebody with perfectionism because good enough doesn’t resonate if it’s something from which we derive our value. We are not going to settle for subpar or mediocre performance if that means that we are subpar or mediocre.

I appreciate that we can try to tackle that by keeping high standards but also giving people some room and permission to make mistakes and ask questions, and to just deal with the inevitable blips and bloops of life that are going to come along.

Kerrissey: If a big part of this is not to lower our standards, when does it start to tip into that negative space? What are some things that you can look out for? I have found that perfectionism is often thought of as a personal problem, but it’s also an interpersonal problem, that it comes across as a sense that we have to earn love, community, and belonging by being good at things, by having a good performance. In the therapy room, I keep an eye out for this sense that we have to earn our way into friendships or other relationships. Think about why your friends are your friends: Are you friends with your friends because of their performance? Probably not. More likely you are friends with your friends because of how you feel when you’re with them. There’s a sense of being understood or belonging. And most importantly, I think, not having to perform at all. One of the telltale signs is avoidance, avoidance of something that you want to try, something that you want to put your hands up for, and you don’t do it because you’re afraid if you’re going to try it out and not be perfect, that will be a failure for you. I see that happen all the time in my classrooms. The point of being here, the point of going through our educational system is to learn what you need to learn to have the impact that you want to have in your life. If perfectionism is driving you to avoid that things that are a little hard that you might not be very good at, it’s holding you back from achieving the broader purpose in your life.

“One of the telltale signs is avoidance of something that you want to try … and you don’t do it because you’re afraid if you’re going to try it out and not be perfect, that will be a failure for you.”

Wallace: Other signs are negative self-talk. Procrastination is another big telltale sign of perfectionism. To pick up on what Michaela said, I got this great quote from a child psychologist, Lisa Damour, who said that a colleague of hers told her this once: The difference between a 91 and a 98 is a life. And so when you’re thinking about the focus of where you are putting your energy, often with perfectionism, it is about self-protection, and that is actually what is holding us back. What I see in the research was that, actually, it was the perfectionist who would hold themselves back because their sense of worth was so tangled up that they couldn’t risk a failure. They could not risk that.

Laine Perfas: I have a confession. I am someone who is struggling with perfectionism and I feel like it is just an ongoing practice to try to be aware of when I’m falling into those cycles. But given that and reflecting on it, I was trying to figure out: What job is perfectionism doing in my life? Why is it that I keep turning to it even though I can feel the anxiety, I can feel the stress? Why is it hard to let it go?

Wallace: To give yourself a break here, I think that we are all responding to the messages of our wider culture. There was this great theologian, Henri Nouwen, who talks about the three great lies of our culture. And those lies are: I am what I have; I am what I do; I am what people say or think about me. If you are constantly contending with the great lies in our culture, of course you’re going to want to protect with perfectionism. For me, the first step is contextualizing these tendencies and not personalizing them so much. Look at them. Look at the messages that you are receiving from the wider culture and give yourself some grace.

Kerrissey: I love that idea of grace because even for myself, as I do self-describe as a recovering perfectionist, I can get into these odd spirals that are very ironic, where in trying to address my perfectionism, I get weirdly perfectionist about it and that I observe my own behavior and I’m like, “Ugh. Oh, there I go. I’m being a perfectionist again.” And then I further do the negative self-talk, and that is not what the answer is here, clearly. One of the reframes that I’ve found helpful in my own life and also in being a mom around this — I have a little daughter, and working with her has been quite helpful to me on it, in that I’ve been focusing on this reframe from perfectionism to mastery. Where we don’t have to be ashamed of the drive to learn something really deeply, to try our hardest to contribute value. That drive, when I see it in her, I see there’s a real beauty in it and something that I appreciate and applaud and celebrate, and I don’t want to tell her to not have that or to feel bad about having that. I want to tell her to keep that focus on mastering something that is hard and will give you satisfaction and gives you the sense – Jennifer used, you used the word “mattering.” I think that’s a beautiful word for it. To channel all of that energy into the wonderful, productive thing that it can be in our lives, to make a life of meaning. Sam, for you, when I see you tell that story, I think part of the reason you’re not letting it go also is that you know there is something good in that drive, and can we capture that?

Hendriksen: What I’ve noticed is that I, and many people who struggle with perfectionism, do this thing called perfectionistic self-presentation, where we show what’s going well and we tend to hide what’s not going well. We put our best foot forward, but we hide the mess. But one place where that can backfire is that then we come across as superhuman or unrelatable or intimidating, and that keeps us isolated and disconnected. And so one thing that we can do to try to reconnect or to try to show some of the mess if we want to think about it in a productive way, then we can — I know vulnerability has become sort of a buzzword, but if we think about it as a willingness to reveal thoughts, actions, and emotions that might result in criticism or rejection, but take a leap of faith that they won’t, we can think of vulnerability, literally vulnerable, as being at risk. Then by letting people deliberately see some of the mess, it does two things. It signals, I trust you. And it also signals, we are the same. And trust and equality are the foundations of any healthy relationship.

Wallace: I love that. There is research called the Beautiful Mess Effect, and it is the idea that we think we need our lives to be perfect before we reach out to people, and what the research finds is that it is in the messiness of our lives that we are able to make that connection. You also brought up, Michaela, about having a daughter, and wanting to model good behavior. I have a daughter. My daughter’s now 18 years old, but when she was young, I was noticing perfectionistic tendencies and so I wrote an article for the Wall Street Journal, and of course I found out that it was my modeling that was leading her to these perfectionistic tendencies. And so I worked really hard on myself, but also living my life out loud so that she could hear my self-talk. If I’m working hard on an article, on a deadline, I will close my laptop in front of her and I will say, “OK, Jenny, that’s enough for the day, you’ve done your work. That’s enough for the day.” So, really modeling this compassionate self-talk when I make a mistake, when I need to give myself grace and a break. I love that you are modeling change out loud for her. That is a powerful way to get into our self-criticism or negative self-talk and try to push back on it a little bit.

Hendriksen: Something that I also like to do is to try to pull the lever of acceptance. In addition to changing my self-critical talk is to try to change my relationship to my self-critical thought, because it is often impossible to get rid of it, per se. Self-criticism is the heart of human self-regulation. We criticize ourselves in order to check ourselves, to make sure our behavior stays in line, make sure we stay part of the group. I just realized that my brain, and the brains of a lot of the people I work with, are just wired to be a little bit more self-critical. And so when inevitably that starts going, then just chalk that up to, oh, this is what happens. This is how I’m wired. That gives me permission to treat it sort of like the music at a coffee shop. It’s there, it’s in the background, but I don’t have to dance along.

Kerrissey: I met someone once who had this great trick that they used where they basically had created a character. It was a little gnome, and they had a little beard and a funny little hat. And every time they would hear that self-critical thought in their own brain, they would just picture that little gnome sitting on their shoulder saying it. And in so doing, while they didn’t get rid of that voice, they sort of were able to put it in its place by seeing it, visualizing it, giving it a hat, and then letting it go.

Hendriksen: Not to get too academic about it, this has a name and it’s called cognitive diffusion. And it can do a couple of things for us. One is that it just lessens the power of the self-criticism, but it also gives us some power back. If we are just passively responding to all the thoughts our brain makes, that puts us in a very low power position. If we can have some influence over our thought, to sort of play with it, to have some fun with it, to maybe make it a little irreverent or humorous, that puts us in a much higher power position over our thoughts and gives us some more agency.

Wallace: One of the things that makes perfectionism so brittle, is the idea that reaching out for help is an admission that you are not perfect. And what we know from decades’ worth of resilience research is that our resilience rests fundamentally on the depth and support of our relationships. If you are holding back from asking for help because you don’t want a peek behind your perfect facade, that is where we can get into a lot of trouble. And one of the things that has helped is the idea that when I don’t reach out for help, not only do I deny myself the support I need and deserve, I also deny my friend the chance of being a helper, of sending her or him the signal that I trust them, that I trust their kindness and their wisdom, they matter to me. So if we could think of asking for help less as a weakness or an inconvenience, and more as an act of generosity, of telling someone in our life that they matter so much to us that we are asking them for help.

Laine Perfas: I want to bring up an idea that has been floated, which is the part of perfectionism that can also make it difficult to be at peace when you fail to do something or you don’t do it to the level that you would like. How do we accept not just that obviously we are going to fail sometimes, but that failure could also benefit us in some ways?

Kerrissey: I think that is great framing, Sam, for this because not only is it that we can have more acceptance of failure, there is probably ample room for us to celebrate failure much more than we do. And that often if we don’t know how to do something, you’ve never done it before or it’s really complex, it’s really hard, and we try it and we fail, it’s something to be celebrated because we’ve learned. When we study groups and teams and we see them at work, teams that set aside time to celebrate their failures in the long term perform better, and the research on that is clear. And the reason is that they learn so much faster than the groups that don’t try it out, don’t fail, and don’t celebrate those failures.

Kerrissey: I think you hit on the point, that with our failures it is the social support that gets us through. So when you fail in a team, it is the people reminding you that you matter no matter what.

Hendriksen: Just to echo the social component, I think failure can give us the chance to discover that our belonging is not contingent upon performance. So for example, I was working with a professional musician who lost an audition, and his knee-jerk reaction was to assume that his colleagues just wouldn’t respect him anymore, that his performance was what tied him to them and he was able to discover that not only did his colleagues indeed still like and respect him, but that the sense of community and the liking came not from what happened on one worst day, but what he did every day in that community. Perfectionism tends to be really all or nothing. And so something that I’ve found useful is to try to take my thinking from either/or to both/and. We can be a good mom who occasionally loses our temper. We can be a smart person who doesn’t always know the answer. We can be a capable person who sometimes screws things up. We can retain that overall sense of our own competency and adequacy and create some room for the inevitable exceptions that life is going to throw at us.

Wallace: To go even further on the social buffering of perfectionism, if you will. Since learning about this idea of mattering — and mattering matters throughout the lifespan — I just co-authored a working paper with the Harvard Center on the Developing Child about early childhood and the development of mattering. And it matters up until we take our last breath. But what I will say is, as a culture, we are not feeding this need to matter. This is a fundamental human need to feel valued and to have an opportunity to add value. And when we don’t meet this need, one of the side effects is this perfectionism, that maybe if I’m perfect, I will matter. So what I would love to offer to anybody listening, which is an exercise I try to do in my own life, very imperfectly, to be honest, is I try to imagine everyone I meet, including strangers on the street, wearing a sign around their neck saying, “Tell me, do I matter?” We can all answer that question with kindness, with compassion, and to me, if we could, instead of feeling like we are pit against each other in this hyper-individualistic culture that we find ourselves in, if we could go back and recenter our relationships around mattering, I think that is a way of buffering against the socially prescribed perfectionism that has been on the rise.

There is a solution, there is an antidote, and it is mattering.

Laine Perfas: Thank you all for joining me for this really great conversation today.

Wallace: Thank you for having us.

Kerrissey: Thank you.

Hendriksen: Thank you so much. This was fun.

Laine Perfas: Thanks for listening. To see a transcript of this episode and to find our other episodes, visit harvard.edu/thinking. This episode was hosted and produced by me, Samantha Laine Perfas, with editing and production support from Sarah Lamodi and additional editing by Ryan Mulcahy, Paul Makishima, and Max Larkin. Original music and sound design by Noel Flatt. Produced by Harvard University. Copyright 2025.