Why It Makes Good Business Sense to Slack Off

A letter that has been passed to new business school students for decades carries a clear message for the overachievers of the world: Chill out.

“Most of us come in here as perfectionists and feel very uncomfortable doing a so-so job on anything. The sooner you give up this habit, the happier you will be,” wrote Shirzad Bozorgchami, a 1989 graduate of Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. The writer is now known as Shirzad Chamine, and the letter was published byBloomberg Businessweek.

Such guidance may seem a bit out of harmony with business school and the entire foundation of the American work ethic, which has long conflated endless toil with virtue. But some in the corporate world agree with Chamine’s skepticism.