It’s my curse……. no I am serious….. no really, you can stop laughing now.
A wise man, or possibly a textbook, once said that more time and resources are lost though indecision than bad decisions. Sad thing is that this is a truism that many of us forget. It doesn’t matter how much time and effort are spent on any one task, unless it is made solely for your own edification, it can’t be perfect. In an organisation that relies on dozens of people working together your perfect project will seem flawed to some, sometimes even downright foolish to others. It is pretty much unavoidable.
We all have our own styles, opinions, priorities, and those will influence how we look at the work we do, and the work others do. Every completed task has to be the result of compromise, thus ‘near-enough’ is the best result we can hope for in any given work. The trick is to know when it is better to deliver the work that meets the fundamental aims of the task, and when it will be productive to keep trying to improve the final result.
We are all, at our core, arrogant. Our way is the best way, our vision the most clear. It follows then that those we work with are the same. Their vision is the correct one (in their eyes), their way the best path. You cannot please all the people all the time, but what you can do is deliver a quality product, that meets the criteria you were given, with the resources and time you had available. You can’t really do more than that.
Far more importantly, it is both unproductive and unhealthy to try. Be good at what you do, trying to be perfect just leads to stress and disappointment when you can’t reach unobtainable goals.
…..and if all else fails, pretend that you’re here