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Not really sure I agree with the article. Most of the top entreprnrs I know/heard of did rather well at school. While some may drop out, they didn't drop out

Not really sure I agree with the article. Most of the top entreprnrs I know/heard of did rather well at school. While some may drop out, they didn't drop out as 2.0 students, but rather generally bright and recognized students who could have proceeded academically if so inclined (think Gates, Zuckerberg, Brin, Page, Yang, Filo, etc...). The perfectionism makes some sense, but seems at odds with the current infatuation with Jobs. Jobs couldn't find the right beige from a set of 200 and had to design a new beige. He seemed like the ultimate perfectionist -- sometimes. I think maybe the point is better made that there are times to be a perfectionist and times not to be. I think the hard part is figuring out when those times are.

vladd 15y ago
Jobs delivered. His company Apple delivered a new version every year. That always was his trump card, perfectionism came within these bounds. When FaceTime was the only feature he liked, he dropped everything else and announced on stage that it is the only main thing that they've added (and then went on about how cool it is). There's a video on the net [1] showing him as NeXT CEO and even then he talked about the time they've got to make it work and how they can fit into it. [1] http://thenextweb.com/shareables/2011/11/20/watch-steve-jobs-brainstorm-with-the-next-team-in-this-fascinating-video/ http://thenextweb.com/shareables/2011/11/20/watch-steve-jobs...
- ilaksh 15y ago
  It sounds like its about prioritization and selection of tasks as much as it is about knowing when to stop improving things. This gets into what (should be) basic project management knowledge. There is only a certain amount of scope and level of quality that is possible given a fixed set of resources and time. I think a lot of groups try to do too many different things perfectly and spread themselves too thin, ultimately sacrificing quality and letting deadlines slip. They should be putting extra time and effort into the most important things, leaving off of other problems when the solutions are good enough, and dropping or deferring some unimportant tasks.
SatvikBeri 15y ago
Jobs also said "real artists ship." Perfectionism with set deadlines seems to be a pretty good compromise-obsess with making your product as good as it can be but don't let product concerns push back your deadlines.

vladd 15y ago

Jobs delivered. His company Apple delivered a new version every year. That always was his trump card, perfectionism came within these bounds. When FaceTime was the only feature he liked, he dropped everything else and announced on stage that it is the only main thing that they've added (and then went on about how cool it is). There's a video on the net [1] showing him as NeXT CEO and even then he talked about the time they've got to make it work and how they can fit into it. [1] http://thenextweb.com/shareables/2011/11/20/watch-steve-jobs-brainstorm-with-the-next-team-in-this-fascinating-video/ http://thenextweb.com/shareables/2011/11/20/watch-steve-jobs...

ilaksh 15y ago
It sounds like its about prioritization and selection of tasks as much as it is about knowing when to stop improving things. This gets into what (should be) basic project management knowledge. There is only a certain amount of scope and level of quality that is possible given a fixed set of resources and time. I think a lot of groups try to do too many different things perfectly and spread themselves too thin, ultimately sacrificing quality and letting deadlines slip. They should be putting extra time and effort into the most important things, leaving off of other problems when the solutions are good enough, and dropping or deferring some unimportant tasks.

SatvikBeri 15y ago

Jobs also said "real artists ship." Perfectionism with set deadlines seems to be a pretty good compromise-obsess with making your product as good as it can be but don't let product concerns push back your deadlines.