Quantity Makes Quality
#4. Quantity Is As Important As Quality
I always heard people said that a quality is more important than quantity. Let’s say in publishing academic paper. Lecturers tend to write many paper to achieve high number publications and citations in google without considering a quality. Even, similar lecturer’s name will show on and on in other publications as second or third writers. The important thing is the number of publication. From that reason, I can understand people said that the quality is important.
However, my perspective on quality has changed that once heard in one of podcast that that quantity makes a quality. A legend basket ball player, Michael Jordan, keeps practicing ten hour a day, to maintain his perfomance quality. Ten hour is quantity, making a quality. Cristiano Ronaldo spends five-six hour a day in a soccer field, gym or swimming pool. People having a good achievement have a routine activity to “shape the saw”.
So I believe, to be a good writer is not enough when I only write one article in a month or in a year. It is nonsense. I cannot imagine the only article I made becomes viral. It is impossible. Even though I believe the article is high quality manuscript, still the few number is not enough. Let’s say, the only article hits people attention around the world, my critical question, can I become a legend with the only article I make?
I will never contradict a quantity and quality since both of them affect each other. They are equal important. As English teacher, I keep saying in front of my students, “Please class, you should keep reading to enrich new vocabularies. Discuss with your friends in English to make your English speaking fluent. See the mirror or record your presentation, so you can check your public speaking. Write in platform like Medium.com, to sharpen your writing skills.”
My instruction to students all is about quantity. “Keep reading, discussing with their friends, writing, and others” represents the number of activities they should perform to get a good competence in English. The activities are expected to be a good habit. A good performance will never get when students just sit down, sleep, and day dream all the days.
What I have to do to obtain the expected quality especially in writing as follow.
- Love what I do. Passion is a key word. I love writing. I’m really glad when people read my articles, giving a good feedback as if the article gave them a positive vibe. That is more than enough. Since I love writing, I keep writing whenever I have time or at least I always provide slot time to write. Writing is no burden for me. I don’t care if nobody reads my article. Once the article is posted, I’m really happy indeed!
- Keep writing. “Practice makes perfect” a proverb said. Keep writing and writing and writing. I improve my sense of grammar, diction, sentence logic and punctuation by writing. My point here is there is no a perfect product in writing. I will never post my writing if I’m waiting my writing becomes a perfect. Just keep writing, believe me, the new idea will come to you.
- Connect fellow publications. I have just known that Medium.com has publication scheme. I wonder why many writer in this platform has many follower while I only have 20 followers during a year (2023). Maybe by joining publication, the followers are accelerated. I contacted many editors and I found Jurnal Kita, trying to publish my first article in Jurnal Kita. My expectation after I connected with some publications is I can be more and more productice in writing article in Medium.com.
I conclude If you want to reach a good quality, please you should consider the quantity you have made.
Denny Kodrat is a passionate writer, citizen journalist and educator, based in Sumedang, West Java Province, Indonesia.
