Perfection Serves No One But Itself.

 "The best is the enemy of the good," Voltaire.

"He who is determined not to be satisfied with anything short of perfection will never do anything to please himself or others," William Hazlitt.

"Perfection is the enemy of good," Gustave Flaubert.

Extremes rarely work to the health and benefit of those striving for it or the goals they strive for. This is one of the common blocks to success. If you can't move on to the next phase or stage in your project until the one you are working on now is perfect, you may never move on. In that, good is not served. And so the perfectionist creates his/her own dilemma.

I have heard speakers spend so much time defining words and terms they want to use in their speech and in such exacting detail, the point of the speech is lost. 

Industry is full of stories of research and development teams attempting to make the product they are producing so perfect that by the time it gets to market, the product is obsolete. How do you balance "good enough to function" against "so bad it won't work"? 

The way out of or through dilemmas is to find and accept a third answer or another option in addition to the two "Either Or" options which constitute the horns of the dilemma on which one is hung up. In the case of "Either perfect or Not at all" the third option is to get comfortable with mediocrity. Mediocre is not best or worst but middle of the road. It is commonplace. Although it may feel like a compromise, it will release the struggling person who says "Perfect or Bust" and gets things moving again. 


I am not against perfection and striving for the best. I am offering a solution for the occasions when progress toward a desired goal is arrested by the compulsive need to be perfect. As some have said, "Stability exists when we work for progress, not perfection." 

A final thought: after this perfect mountain is climbed, there is another, higher, more perfect mountain behind that, and then another beyond that and then another.... What a wonderful way to lose control of your life. Enough never becomes enough. 

Pursuit becomes the game and living in the moment long enough to enjoy what has been gained in the pursuit never happens.

A Coaching Parable, With A Moral, As Usual

Once, in an ancient circus a dear mother elephant gave birth to her one and only offspring, a son. She loved him as a good mother should, cared for and protected him.

As the boy elephant grew, things about him came to light. He was intelligent, curious, obedient and as all elephants should, remembered everything. One thing stood out; he had very long ears. In fact, as he grew, his ears grew twice as fast. Soon, they drug the ground when he walked and came underfoot, causing him to step on them and trip. When he tried to run and play, he'd fall, roll in the dirt and tumble like a weed.

Then the greatest of insults: the other circus animals laughed and ridiculed him. They called him "Dumbo". After a time, mostly all the mother's son could do was hide shyly behind her and weep in shame. Even his mother felt the disgrace and became disheartened.

As a last resort, Mother Elephant hired a coach for her son. The coach was called "Timothy the Mouse". He wore a red top hat, a gold chain around his tiny neck and waved a baton in the air when he gave orders. Up onto the head of Dumbo he sprang to get to work and solve this problem. But, this was no run-of-the-mill coaching challenge. Dumbo was mired in negative self image. He told Timothy he, the coach, was the worst of his tormentors teasing him with false promise of success despite his birth defect.
Timothy persisted. "You are not who you think you are. You are a flying elephant, the star of the circus, the only such elephant alive. Come on. I'll prove it to you. Climb with me to the top of the tallest circus tent pole, jump and you will fly." Both Dumbo and his mother thought this was over the line for Timothy to taunt Dumbo with his disability and Mother Elephant fired Timothy the Mouse on the spot.

"I have one last secret plan", Timothy said. "One more try and I'll leave you alone in your misery. Just a minute and I'll be right back. I have to get my secret weapon."

Soon he returned with a large black feather. "Here, Dumbo. Hold this magic feather in your trunk when you jump and it will make you fly. You'll be the star of the show, rich and famous. To prove my belief in you, I'm gonna sit on top your head when you jump. If you crash, I'll crash. We'll both be circus toast!"

Dumbo had no better plan. Neither did his mother. Secretly, both thought Dumbo might be better off dead. So, Dumbo made the climb with Timothy to the top of the tent. He held the magic feather tightly in his trunk, closed his tearful eyes and when Timothy counted to "Three", he jumped. "Wheeee," yelled Timothy.
"This is really fun!" Dumbo opened one eye a squint and looked out. Only, he had to look down to see anything. Sure enough, his ears were wings and he was flying high above the circus sawdust floor.

To shorten the telling of this hugely successful story, Dumbo became the hit of the circus. People thronged to see the amazing, flying elephant. He was no longer sad. His mother was no longer embarrassed. But, that is not where this story ends.

One afternoon, as he always did, Dumbo jumped to the drum roll far below him and the crowd held their breath while Timothy sat smiling in his usual spot on Dumbo's head. But Dumbo had become a bit careless. He forgot to hold the magic feather tightly and it blew from his trunk. Down they plunged, the proud little coach and the mighty flying elephant, the only one in the world.
Timothy knew what to do. He leaned forward and yelled into Dumbo's ear. "Dumbo, that feather was not magic. It came from the old crow that sits outside on top the circus tent. I used it to help you believe in yourself. You're the one who's been doing the magic flying all along. You have yourself and you no longer need that old feather, or me, for that matter."

Again, Dumbo had no better plan. So he stretched out his ears and turned them into splendid wings just before he and his coach would have crashed into the ground. "Wow!," said Timothy the Mouse. "That was close. But you did it, Dumbo. You've turned your best into success." And they celebrated for the rest of the day.  

Paraphrased with great liberties from a story titled "Dumbo the Flying Elephant" by Disney, 1941: Helen Aberson and Harold Pearl, 1939.

The Worst Coaching Advice I Ever Got (And Never Forgot)!

“Here’s my coaching advice,” the track coach told me. “You are not doing your best. If the performance I’ve seen you do in the past few days is your best, quit now and save me the embarrassment of being seen with you as your coach. Right now, you’re not even average, let alone competitive. Stick with me, do as I say and maybe, with lots of sweat and effort on your part, you can improve and make something of yourself.”

Wow, what a bunch of useless advice! Here I was as a young man, trying my heart out to run fast and make the team and the Coach comes along and discounts me and my efforts. I felt guilty. I trusted him more than myself and I was ashamed. Three reasons this was the worst advice I ever got: I felt guilty for being so bad; ashamed I’d even tried out for the team; and thirdly, I lost faith in myself.

I floated around a few days in a daze. Sure, that was the way Runner Coach treated everyone: motivation by put downs and intimidation. Sure he knew more about running than I did, but did he really know more about me than I did?

The learning and gift from that episode was a decision I made to trust myself, first, about myself. Second gift was the awareness of what I don’t do as the result of ridicule and negative criticism: better. I look back now into the tracks of my life and I can find no instance where I did anything better as the result of feeling bad or being criticized. Not one.

In fact, I think it is not within the laws of nature for human behavior to change for the positive and sustain that improvement as the result of external negative input. It’s as impossible as getting rich by studying poverty or harvesting rice from sowing apple seeds.
It won’t work.

That’s not to say people don’t or can’t change in the face of demeaning coaching, but the changing will not ultimately be seen as success. And it may not last when the treat is gone.

Now for some coaching advice that works well. When approaching any task or goal or struggling with a decision, use these four guidelines:
1. Show up. Be here, be now and present with as much focus as you are able to produce.
2. Tell the truth without blame or judgment, especially about and to yourself.
3. Be open minded and not attached to particular outcomes. No one controls their future. We control how we relate to it. Keep options open. Ask: what am I overlooking?
4. What has heart and meaning for you must be attended to by you. Follow your light within.

Practice these precepts and I guarantee you will turn your best into the success you desire.

photo by permission

Janet Gets Coached And Saves Her Career.

Janet’s brilliant career was about to sink. If the constant river of negative complaints to Human Resources didn’t subside, she would soon be floated out of her job and her career beached.

To prevent Janet’s pending disaster, her superiors hired coach Bill Tidd for her. Bill is the director of the Saint Luke’s Health System Employee Assistance Program and the new Performance Plus™ leadership coaching program in Kansas City, MO.

“My job as coach,” says Bill Tidd, “is to take people from where they are to where they want to be.” The Harvard Business Review in November 2004 states that coaching is like “the wild west of yesteryear; this frontier is chaotic, largely unexplored and fraught with risk.” However, the feature article went on to say that the coaching process is “immensely promising” for leaders.

Corporate America is catching on to the value of a trusted person who can serve as coach. Coaching moves leaders and everyday folks alike from the best they can do at the moment to the point of success they desire. Examples abound. Sandra Wimpelberg, internal executive coach for the American Baptist Churches of the Central Region credits personal coaching with turning her life and ministry “right side up.” “Coaching is an exciting journey of discovery and tapping into potential that I didn’t know was there,” states Wimpelberg.

Even President Bush has been encouraged to get a coach. Jim Hoagland, Washington Post columnist, on September 29, 2005 says the President is in need of a “blunt friend.”

None of us know all there is to know about ourselves, let alone what to do or not to do to stop blocking ourselves from getting where we want to be. Left on our own, we tend to keep doing the same things wondering why we don’t get results we want. The coach is that “blunt friend” who calls you back to reality and makes the difference in your journey to success. Writers have editors, athletes have coaches, CEO’s have stock holders and Boards of Directors. Alone, we only go so far in the world of success. Do you need a coach?

So, what happened to Janet? Coach Bill asked her to take the Kolbe A Index, an assessment tool which gave Janet feedback about her functional capacities at work. She was lacking in her focus on implementation of projects she and her team had put into motion. Before the last plan was in place and carried out, Janet would be issuing directives to pushing her team to initiate more new programs. Her team was overloaded, confused and frustrated. Janet was not able to understand their concerns, thinking the team was slacking off. In turn, her co-workers complained repeatedly to Human Resources about Susan’s poor leadership

With this understanding, Coach Bill worked to strengthen Janet’s leadership style. He helped her devise a plan to enable Susan to work with her team to finish what they had started before taking on the next challenge. Janet worked the coaching plan. She regained trust and respect from her team and gave them the leadership they needed. She also saved her career.

A good and qualified coach can help brilliant careers stay afloat and moving. All you have to do is hire a good one, then use them for all they are worth.
photo attribution:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/72341818@N00/ / CC BY 2.0

Coach or Crony: Do You Know The Difference?

Psychologist and researcher Carol Dweck says the “key to success in life is to adopt a ‘growth’ mindset as opposed to a ‘fixed’ one.” She goes on to discuss results from her research on “mindsets”: “People with a fixed mindset believe their basic qualities are carved in stone, so they are concerned about making their abilities look good. Those with a growth mindset believe their basic abilities can be cultivated through dedication and education. They are more concerned about stretching themselves.”

A “crony” is a good-ole-boy (or girl) who supports another person’s status quo. Cronies don’t challenge each other. They encourage the old, safe ways and with flattery attempt to make the fixed traits of their associates look good. A coach doesn’t care if you look good or not. The effective coach strives to disrupt the status quo of those he or she works with and make them stretch. The crony makes you wary of challenges, especially if the learning involves the risk of failure. The good coach orients you toward learning and the changes that are necessary to get you from where you are to where you say you want to be, even if that involves the risk of things looking worse before they get better.

Be wary when choosing a coach who’s main technique is that of cheering and excessive praise. There is nothing wrong with encouragement and when used at the proper time, can help to solidify gains and progress. But first we need to make the changes and do the hard work of moving out of old comfort zones. A coach worth hiring knows how to work with growth minded individuals and show them the strategies of change. Then that same coach also knows how to help you maintain the changes you took the risks to make.

So, interview the coach you are considering. Determine if that coach uses a fixed mindset or a growth mindset. An easy test is to know if the coach praises effort, strategy and improvement in the people he or she works with or intelligence and talent. Beware of the coach who places emphasis on the later because those aspects of a person are fixed.