Imperfect action: What does progress look like?

Hey 🙂

There’s something important about your ability to start things without finishing them the same day.

To be comfortable in the messy middle of project management — lots of things started, nothing quite finished yet.

This came to me because we wrapped up a task that took three weeks to get done. Not because anyone was lazy or procrastinating — simply down to priorities.

Here’s what we didn’t do: we didn’t wait for the perfect moment to start. We didn’t wait until we could finish it before we started it. There’s something important in getting things started even knowing you won’t finish today — starting is part of the process. Being comfortable in that messy middle, where several things are some degree started and moving toward done but not finished, is the work.

And there’s something great about the feeling when you spend just 10 minutes on it on that final day and it’s finished — you get over the line.

The opposite of that is perfection — trying to do everything perfectly. You simply won’t make progress that way.

It’s amazing how, if you just ask yourself every day: “What does progress look like? If I just did something to move this along today, what would that be?” — that’s enough.

🗣️ 👀

Chris.