On Beating Perfectionism.

You miss 100% of the creative shots you don’t take. You’ll never have a hit until you make 100x. Creativity is about iteration, about making things better. We make better things through cycling and making and cycling and making. And we keep going. We don’t stop. We never stop! There is never a need to stop.

The Pixar movie is never really finished. It merely has to be released to the schedule the Disney suits set. We’re moving things from suck to not-so-sucky. We’re making things better. We are always try to improve things. We see the patterns in things and ask why?

Iterate. Edit. Fix. You won’t get it right immediately out of the gate.

People tend to forget the iterative nature of Creativity. You almost never get it right out of the gate. No. You’re taking a shot. One shot. Then, another. Then, another. Then, another. The best way to get one great camera shot is to take 1,000 of them. Then, go again. Then, go again. Now, production’s over. Let’s head into Post. Now, we see what we truly got. Then, we fix as we can. Iterate. Edit. Fix. Iterate. Edit. Fix. What Post is all about.

And still Ship. ‘Great artists Ship.’

We can always be fixing. Always be fixing the audio. Always fixing the color. Always fixing the script. Always fixing the acting and movement. Always fixing / managing the suits up. Always fixing the marketing. Only there has to be a point of release. That should happen around the 80% mark.

Get Feedback early. Get feedback often.

We ought to get feedback earlier and more often. What do people like? What does your market want? What do people dislike? How will we iterate forward? What does the next version look like?

Iteration beats perfection.

Iteration beats perfection any day of the week. In fact, to perfect something 100% aligns with iteration. Because iteration is all about making things better. Creatives constantly iterate, constantly make things better with our magic dust. We are all about sprinkling our magic dust over our projects. We’re always thinking about them. Always. We never stop. We dream about them. We see the letters move around in our minds. We see the letters move around in Photoshop. We’re constantly moving things around, iterating, making things better.

You must Ship!

Perfectionists forget that the way you make something better is to work it to a certain point, and then release it! Release it! Ship! Great artists ship! Just like Steve said. And…GO!

Shit’s never gonna be perfect. Get over your own damn self already.

Only perfectionists are usually stuck on perfect, that which they cannot define. They can’t define perfection because no one can. No one person can define perfection sufficiently. Because it is subjective! And dumb! And a waste of time! Shit’s never gonna be perfect — get over your own damn self already and get back to the important work of iterating!

(I say this to myself as much as I coach it to other Creatives. We spend far too much time in our own way. We’ve got to get out of our own way.)

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