{"id":414,"date":"2014-09-05T08:56:40","date_gmt":"2014-09-05T08:56:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mylessonslearned.co\/?p=414"},"modified":"2014-09-27T09:51:42","modified_gmt":"2014-09-27T09:51:42","slug":"11-dont-aim-for-perfect-aim-for-the-best-you-can-do","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mylessonslearned.co\/?p=414","title":{"rendered":"11. Don&#8217;t aim for perfect. Aim for the best you can do."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We come to work with a desire to perform, to excel, and to do the best job we can.\u00a0 Many of us have been trained: in school, by our parents, by our peers, by the media to be perfect. Perfection is the ultimate goal. Or is it?<\/p>\n<p>I would argue that perfection is impossible and that it actually creates different kinds of problems for people, especially at work. So here&#8217;s what I&#8217;ve seen:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The person who is always working late hours, missing deadlines because the work output isn&#8217;t perfect.<\/li>\n<li>The person who delays making a decision, deferring it because they need more analysis, facts, and people to\u00a0check with to make the perfect decision.<\/li>\n<li>The person who is afraid to make a decision for fear of being wrong and not being perfect.<\/li>\n<li>The person who\u00a0takes it personally\u00a0when something goes wrong because they&#8217;re not perfect.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So let me clear&#8230;you can&#8217;t be at an <em>unacceptable<\/em> standard of performance. <em>You have to be accurate<\/em>. But getting to the next level of &#8220;perfect&#8221; burns a lot of calories&#8230;and the law of diminishing returns starts kicking in. Not to mention, the clock is ticking. Remember the professor who marked you down a grade when your paper was late? Well, that also applies at work as well. &#8220;Perfect&#8221; delivered late isn&#8217;t perfect.<\/p>\n<p><strong>No one<\/strong> expects you to be perfect at work&#8230;. you&#8217;re expected to make mistakes. Now, some mistakes\u00a0it&#8217;s hard to\u00a0recover from (see Lessons Learned number 1), but most mistakes you can, depending on how you handle it. No boss will ever tell you perfection is the goal&#8230;but continuous improvement is. That means 1) fix the problem, and 2) make sure it never happens again.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s the analogy I often use: yes, we need a flight plan in order to take off. But if we spend all our time on the tarmac trying to account for every possibility that could occur, we&#8217;re just burning fuel and time. Once you get the plane in the air, you&#8217;ll have the ability to make inflight adjustments. You always want a plan B. But at some point, you have to go.<\/p>\n<p>You are not perfect. You know that: so\u00a0stop holding yourself to that standard. What you are is someone who can learn, and gain experiences to be successful in what life throws at you. What&#8217;s better than perfect? Peace of mind knowing you are doing the best you can do.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We come to work with a desire to perform, to excel, and to do the best job we can.\u00a0 Many of us have been trained: in school, by our parents, by our peers, by the media to be perfect. Perfection is the ultimate goal. Or is it? I would argue that perfection is impossible and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":432,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[16],"tags":[18,6],"class_list":["post-414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-happiness","tag-mindset","tag-work-behavior"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>11. 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