2176: When Good is Good Enough: Five Situations When Perfection Is Counterproductive by Laura Stack of The Productivity Pro on Time Management

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[00:00:56] This is Optimal Work Daily. When Good is Good Enough. Five Situations When Perfection is Counterproductive. By Laura Stack of theproductivitypro.com. Quote, Perfection is achieved not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. End quote. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, author of The Little Prince.

[00:01:21] Ever heard the term good enough for government work? I heard that a lot growing up in a military family. Despite how it may sound, it's neither a low-bidder type of comment nor an excuse for poor work. It just means you've done the work to the required specifications and can move on. This is crucial when you've got a lot of non-critical tasks on your plate. There really are times when good enough is good enough. When perfection just gets in your way. You don't always have to do a job perfectly.

[00:01:48] In this blog, we'll consider a few common cases where perfection is a waste of time and becomes the enemy of good. You don't want to waste time fixing something you did wrong in the first place, of course. But if you stay mindful, you can do the job properly and well enough the first time. Stat. Good enough is good enough when... 1. You have limited time to launch When you care about your job, you want to do the best you possibly can.

[00:02:14] The urge to prove yourself never really ends, and even when you have proven yourself, you know the old story. Those who do the best work get rewarded with more work. But you rarely have all the time we need to get all your ducks perfectly in a row. So sometimes the best you can do is to lay out the timeline, split the work up into chunks, launch the pieces when they're good enough, and put it all back together when you're done. You can then fix the problems on the fly, or patch the product as you go.

[00:02:41] Microsoft, one of the biggest corporations in the world, works this way all the time. 2. You're overwhelmed Do you work for a manager who insists all projects share top billing and refuses to prioritize? If so, you have no choice but to pick one thing and work on it until you've completed as much and as best as you can. If he or she continues to push you to get everything out at once, adopt the good enough is good enough mantra. So you can release pieces as you complete them, rather than trying to perfect them.

[00:03:10] That way you can move on to the next project and circle back again to the other later to make headway on another piece. 3. You're waiting on information As leaders, we don't always have the complete picture and total information. When you are quote-unquote waiting on input from others, use the presumptive close technique. If I don't hear from you by X, I'm going to do Y on Z.

[00:03:34] Think of high-priority items like hot potatoes that need to get off your plate, rather than waiting, while several days go by. Even if a high-level decision hasn't been completely resolved, you can do your piece of it and put it back in front of the responsible people for reaction. As you move up in leadership responsibility, decisive action doesn't allow time for perfectionism, since you must advise others instead of waiting in a passive role. That way, your part is done, but others can hammer out the politics between them and get back to you should any changes be required.

[00:04:04] 4. You need a ballpark estimate Sometimes you only need a guesstimate, not a perfect cost analysis. Is it $100k or $1 million? I once worked with a VP who asked one of her employees for an off-the-cuff cost estimate to cite in an upcoming speech, but failed to tell the employee it wasn't that important for the number to be exactly correct. Ten grueling hours later, her employee produced a tight, tidy cost estimate.

[00:04:30] Because neither bothered to clarify the task, that simple estimate cost an unreasonable amount and took more than a day's opportunity and salary cost for the employee. And 5. When it takes more and more energy to achieve smaller gains You've heard of the law of diminishing returns. If you find it's taking you just as long as before to achieve only 50% of your previous gains, or 10% or 1%, you've hit diminishing returns. It's not worth the investment anymore.

[00:05:00] Sometimes getting something from 90% to 100% takes just as long as getting it from 0% to 90%. Noble, not stupid. It may be noble to have high ambitions, and sure, you want to strive for perfection. But generally, good enough really is good enough most of the time. As a mere human, perfection is rarely attainable. And the fact is, your end users may think what you've got is perfect anyway, or at least highly admirable. Thus, when you have no choice but to move on due to time constraints,

[00:05:29] or you've done the very best you can without going to absurd lengths, call it project done and get it out the door. You can never feel completely happy with anything you complete. But you can feel satisfied, especially in the knowledge that the people you did it for are happy. You just listened to the post titled, When Good is Good Enough, Five Situations When Perfection is Counterproductive,

[00:05:56] by Laura Stack of theproductivitypro.com. This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome? That's new. It can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50-page restoration block, or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it. Ready to make anything online make sense? There's no place like Chrome. Check responses set up required compatibility and availability varies 18+.

[00:06:25] When you need to build up your team to handle the growing chaos at work, use Indeed Sponsored Jobs. It gives your job post the boost it needs to be seen and helps reach people with the right skills, certifications, and more. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit at Indeed.com slash podcast. That's Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need a hiring hero?

[00:06:54] This is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. And thanks so much to Laura, one of our regular authors here. She is an award-winning keynote speaker and the best-selling author of eight books. Her engaging personality, combined with over 25 years of experience helping organizations achieve results, have made her one of the most sought-after experts and keynote speakers in her field. You might have seen Laura featured in the New York Times, USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, Entrepreneur, and Forbes magazine.

[00:07:21] She's been a spokesperson for Microsoft, Danone, 3M, Office Depot, Xerox, and more. And if that wasn't enough, her client list includes top Fortune 500 companies like Starbucks, Walmart, Bank of America, GM, Wells Fargo, and Time Warner, and government agencies such as the U.S. Air Force Academy, the Census Bureau, the U.S. Senate, and the IRS. So there is a lot to learn from her. We feature her here quite regularly for just that reason. And you can come by theproductivitypro.com.

[00:07:51] And Laura has all of her videos, books, her store, her newsletter, and blog all there. Again, it's theproductivitypro.com. But that is going to do it for today. I thank you so much for being a subscriber to the show and being here with me each and every day. And I will see you back here tomorrow where your optimal life awaits. Thank you.