Excellence Over Perfection

Do you want to be perfect, or do you want to be your best and maximize your potential?

As a culture, we have this concept that we must strive for perfection—the perfect house; the perfect career; the perfect marriage; the perfect body. Perfection is viewed by many of us as a positive concept, a positive goal. While it has beneficial qualities, I believe that perfection is ultimately limiting, disempowering, and unattainable.

We must ask ourselves: what does this perfection we are encouraged to chase even look like? 

And, more importantly: is that what we truly want? Will it help me realize and maximize my potential?

Perfection is defined as, “the condition, state, or quality of being free from all flaws or defects.” Our lives and endeavors are expansive, ever-changing, and will always be full of flaws and defects. As human beings, we are perfectly imperfect. So, instead of striving for perfection, we must shift gears if we wish to truly maximize our potential. We should strive for excellence, not perfection.

The Pitfalls of Perfection

When we strive for perfection, the results seem to be satisfying, at least initially. But over time, we will almost always be unsatisfied. For me, I thought perfection would take all my pain and disappointment away. But as we know as adults, this is not possible in life… and not even desirable, as our challenges make us who we are. 

I was a smart kid. 

My parents expected me to do well in school. I strove to get straight A’s, as many kids did. At the time, this was my attempt at perfection and it’s what I thought I should chase. So much so that I remember that getting an A- was a “failure” and would make me feel so disappointed in myself.

Looking back at it now, I laugh at how harsh and dramatic I was, and how driven I was by some lofty goal of perfection. I can also clearly see the pitfalls of perfection. I had this lofty unrealistic of academic perfection that was conditioned into me. It caused me to compare myself, forget to celebrate my success, and give too much weight to my shortcomings. When we operate in such a constraining way, it can leave no room for improvement. We are often so devastated that we don't fit into a particular box of perfection that we can become paralyzed and stagnant in our growth. 

Instead of putting so much effort into achieving perfection, we can transfer that energy into striving for excellence and accepting our mistakes and imperfections as part of our learning and journey.

The Benefits of Imperfection

Imperfection gets a bad rap, but in reality, we’re all flawed beings because we’re all human. In fact, our imperfections have a massive capacity to elevate our lives, if we let them.

Stress, failure, and pain are inevitable parts of life, AND they’re also our greatest teachers. When we try so hard to be perfect, we often become too afraid to take risks and set BHAGs (Big Hairy Audacious Goals). A concept from author and business consultant Jim Collins, BHAGs are seemingly impossible goals we set and strive for. 

Why set a goal that you believe you cannot hit?

The answer: To push yourself to think differently, break limiting beliefs, and maximize your potential in service of achieving this goal. Let me give you an example. I set a BHAG of building a 50 million dollar company by the time I was 50. I honestly did not believe this was possible. I didn't achieve this goal by 50… but I hit it at 51. 

I can almost guarantee that I wouldn’t have achieved this feat if I was focused on perfection (or if I hadn’t even set this BHAG in the first place!). I know this because along the path to striving for this goal, I made mistakes, shifted directions, and failed. There were times where I tried new things and made poor business decisions. There were times when I didn’t meet my business objectives. There were painful times when I had to downsize and lay people off.

All of it was part of my journey, and none of it was to my detriment. In fact, every single failure I’ve experienced personally and professionally has taught me a lesson. It has provided me with the insight I needed to learn, to pivot, to elevate, and to hold myself accountable for growth. All of my imperfections have prepared me to be a better businessman and lead a more resilient company. In the long run, these imperfections not only benefited me—they gave me the courage to take more risks in service of maximizing my potential.

Striving for Excellence Seeds Success 

When I took those risks, I was striving for excellence, not perfection. 

I wanted my company, Lyons Consulting Group, to be the best eCommerce Digital Agency that there was. I realized quickly that this didn’t mean we had to be perfect. It meant we needed to be committed to excellence, learning, and growing at every level of our organization. It is this commitment that led me to take risks like adding a new platform, opening a London office, or eventually getting acquired by a larger company.

All of these risks were taken in the pursuit of excellence. For me, excellence in sales is a simple concept that comes down to three questions:

1. Will this decision benefit my clients so that they can meet and exceed their objectives? 
2. Will this decision help me elevate or empower my company and my team? 
3. Will this decision help me maximize my potential?

If I can answer yes to all of these, then I know that the decisions I’m making are sound. Even if they result in a negative outcome, they are still contributing to excellence, not perfection. It may just take some time to see how.

The Evolution of Excellence

What I love most about the idea of excellence is that it’s ever-changing. It isn’t a fixed idea and it evolves over time. Your idea of excellence at 28 will look different than your idea of excellence at 55. That is because as we learn and grow, and as society and technology change, our vision of excellence changes. When we serve our clients, our teams, and ourselves—we are acting with excellence in mind.

Remember, our trees of excellence grow from the soil of failed strategies, imperfections and mistakes. All of the redirections or missteps we experience therefore become vital nutrients, data, and insights that we need to grow into the best version of ourselves.