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I'm afraid lots of comments are missing the key point in the original post: Do not conflate “the best you can” with “perfect”. The advice is not about perfect

I'm afraid lots of comments are missing the key point in the original post: Do not conflate “the best you can” with “perfect”. The advice is not about perfection, but challenge YOURSELF to do the best you within the constraints such as budget, deadlines, available resources, etc.

spaetzleesser 6y ago
One thing I got from the Bhagavad Gita is the quote “you are entitled to your actions but not the results”. To me this means you should do your best but should into expect specific results. Once you have done your best you did all you could do. The results are out of your hands.
- karmakaze 6y ago
  I might have learned an instance of this. I repeated a Beat Saber song over and over until it was perfect but it lost tracking for a note in the middle and I didnt notice until the end, aargh. I did it again and then the left controller battery died on the third last note. It didn't matter.
disown 6y ago
Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Twirrim 6y ago
Something I keep having to remind myself, and other engineers in teams I work on is "Good enough is good enough". There are plenty of projects they're working on that could be better if they could spend another week or two working on it. But is it sufficient to actually justify that time vs working on other projects? Can we quantify how much difference that extra polish will make several months down the line? I find it hard to fight myself, because no small part of me sees my work in the same way Durnik does: > "Always do the very best job you can," he said on another occasion as he put a last few finishing touches with a file on the metal parts of a wagon tongue he was repairing. > "But that piece goes underneath," Garion said. "No-one will ever see it." > "But I know it's there," Durnik said, still smoothing the metal. "If it isn't done as well as I can do it, I'll be ashamed every time I see this wagon go by - and I'll see the wagon every day!" I landed a huge improvement on a product at work about 9 months ago, after months of work on it. Cut execution times down by a huge amount and made the customer experience more consistent. Managers look at it and see what I achieved. I look at it and see all the things I don't like about it, all the ugly hacks and things that make it work.

spaetzleesser 6y ago

One thing I got from the Bhagavad Gita is the quote “you are entitled to your actions but not the results”. To me this means you should do your best but should into expect specific results. Once you have done your best you did all you could do. The results are out of your hands.

karmakaze 6y ago
I might have learned an instance of this. I repeated a Beat Saber song over and over until it was perfect but it lost tracking for a note in the middle and I didnt notice until the end, aargh. I did it again and then the left controller battery died on the third last note. It didn't matter.

disown 6y ago

Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Twirrim 6y ago

Something I keep having to remind myself, and other engineers in teams I work on is "Good enough is good enough". There are plenty of projects they're working on that could be better if they could spend another week or two working on it. But is it sufficient to actually justify that time vs working on other projects? Can we quantify how much difference that extra polish will make several months down the line? I find it hard to fight myself, because no small part of me sees my work in the same way Durnik does: > "Always do the very best job you can," he said on another occasion as he put a last few finishing touches with a file on the metal parts of a wagon tongue he was repairing. > "But that piece goes underneath," Garion said. "No-one will ever see it." > "But I know it's there," Durnik said, still smoothing the metal. "If it isn't done as well as I can do it, I'll be ashamed every time I see this wagon go by - and I'll see the wagon every day!" I landed a huge improvement on a product at work about 9 months ago, after months of work on it. Cut execution times down by a huge amount and made the customer experience more consistent. Managers look at it and see what I achieved. I look at it and see all the things I don't like about it, all the ugly hacks and things that make it work.