Perfection or Production?

We all want to do our very best work. When is good enough actually enough? Many people that get into creative jobs, like instructional or graphic design, are perfectionists. They are detail oriented, which makes them good at what they do. What I’ve found is that in times of rapid change sometimes production is more appreciated by the business than perfection. We can spend so much time going over every painstaking detail and try to mitigate every “what if” situation. Sometimes a good approach can be using the sorta-kinda good product to solve an immediate need then work toward refining from what you learn along the way.

I think of when I was growing up. My grandma had a boat. She would hardly let us use that boat because it had to stay clean and be put up on the lift just right. I also remember the day she sold the boat still in perfect condition. All I could think about was all the missed out fun and family memories that could have been made on that boat.

There are so many lessons learned from the recent events of COVID-19 that can be applied to business that I could write for months on this. One of those things is that there was an immediate need for training to keep employees and customers safe. A challenge to situation is that information is changes by the day, even hour. If you waited to be perfect you would be too late. You would not have done what’s best for the business. What you can do is get as close to good as you can and then keep evaluating and improving your training.