Just get it done
This is a personal reflection about something I have learnt over the past few months and I hope it is of some use to you. After sending off some stuff, like a a university report and other commitments, it became clear that there is a reason for due dates. This sets a finality, a point where its right to say enough is enough and it must go. It represents a point of freedom and a moment worthy of celebration.
From personal experience, there is no such thing as perfect. No story, situation, job etc. is perfect. There is rarely a perfect question that will be asked, and there is always some level of managing the situation. This does have its advantages; I found myself being more accepting of situations and willing to work with them. It also made me humbler in realising that it is not worth second guessing the opinions and perspectives of others you do not know. Sometimes it is best to just ask them.
This is what getting things done is all about, feedback and learning. Overtime the more I sent out the more feedback I received. It was not always as obvious as expected — the stories and articles that are well read and commented on and those that are not. Those not read gave an indication and the key here is that this begins to uncover the audience, the people who are reading it. I cannot necessarily know their tastes without experimentation. This is one of the key points.
In all work, I will hopefully get feedback. In a piece of coursework, an essay, an article or even a story I could always do better. I could write this a lot better. But if I kept working on it no one would ever see it. No one would ever comment on it. Furthermore, it could be better for who? Writing is for an audience and without feedback it become meaningless, is this something the audience will engage with? So, I found I could try and fail to make it endless perfect for me, but the point is not to just write for myself. It is to write for others and hope that the messages and ideas have some value to them as well as improving the quality of my writing.
But quality is often a subjective term. Quality for whom? Some people like intelligent academically written prose, others find it turgid and difficult to follow — sometimes more time is spent with a dictionary than doing the reading. So, who are you writing for? Sometimes just writing and experimenting is the best way of finding out. This reiterated the key point mentioned above — I found that I do not necessarily know how it will be received until it is out there.
The second point is being gracious in feedback. No-one knows it all and moreover, it is impossible to second guess everything. So, feedback is essential. Some people are trolls and like to be cruel and unhelpful; most people are not and genuinely providing feedback to be helpful; even if at the time it may not appear that way. It is always best to error on the side of graciousness, they may know things I do not. This is a really important point that I learnt; to shut up and take on board the feedback — things go faster that way.
Practice is important. However, practice needs to be meaningful and directed to help you improve. This relates to Anders Eriksson’s idea of deliberate proactive. That is why mentoring and understanding what others who have succeeded in what you are trying to do is important. It is important to get those with credible knowledge to feedback on. Feedback from a few family members and friends is unlikely to be much help.
From putting work out, this feedback can be hard, but is something important to take on. It is about getting the right messages from it and steering further progress in the right direction. In many areas there is not a finite number of attempts, it is more about persistence in development. Here just keep producing and taking on board feedback is likely to develop traction. This is what I found, that constructive and challenging feedback is likely to improve the quality of your work and learning.
There are also skills aspects, being able to produce work quickly and to an acceptable standard, which is determined by those who “consume” the “product” is very useful. For instance, there are many sites that host articles including your own blog; you can develop an audience more to your likely by going out and finding them. However, you still need the writing skills and an appropriate editorial calendar. The point is to generate the regular output at the right targeted audience. This is an important point I gained from writing and getting feedback.
From my experience by doing a lot of writing my ability has improved. Although it is a journey that I am still on, without submitting assignments for checking and taking onboard the feedback and writing articles, I would not have progressed with my writing at all. I have noticed that it has significantly improved over time; I could not use a semi-colon or a paragraph before I started; I could not use basic grammar. Although I still use spelling and grammar checks, this has been an improvement, and in no small way due to continuously doing and shipping work.
The next step is to improve on the work to the next level. I found this is important with feedback and getting things out. I found there is a mindset to most things, and mindsets are something that must be developed. I had to see it for myself and it comes with experience. I could read things and had things mentioned, but that does not mean I saw it. Seeing it is an internalised understanding and appreciation of an aspect of reality. This is a future article and one difficult to express. However, by continuously doing the work and taking on board feedback, I began to see and appreciate what I had read in a whole new light.
The interesting part that I found was that in doing the work and being disciplined about meeting deadlines, the repetition of the work and skills started, with taking on board feedback, to get me to see for myself what I was writing, the audience I was writing for and to grasp the content of what I was writing. In trying to understand a particular technical subject by writing about it, I began to understand it much better, that understanding then began to show in both myself and the writing which it would not have done without the written work. By having deadlines, that force me to do the work, to accept and draw a line with the learning and get it shipped.
By continually working on it, I would only improve it marginally, and the benefits were low. Moving on to the next task and getting some feedback from the work, the benefits were significant; and a reflection of the Pareto principle. Having deadlines forced me to engage and get the work done. This is a necessary part of the learning process. The learning came from doing the process and could not have been imagined beforehand. This is the important point I learnt — the process is learning and it is important to keep doing it.
In sum, there are many things that can be a challenge. However, completing them and learning from feedback from my experience are the best way to learn. There is only so much I can know beforehand and experimenting, by making work available, is often the best step to get the needed learning. In many areas there are many attempts that I can make and these are only limited by my patience and persistence. By keeping on producing I will eventually learn from the feedback and hopefully improve. Therefore, if the early work is not great, this is not an issue — it is only a starting point. By going through the process many times, the mindset of the field starts to appear.
It is not something that is easily articulated and is an internalisation process but very important for future work — it is necessary for getting to the next level. Most things are only marginally improved by holding on to them; the major improvement is letting it go and getting feedback. Most feedback is well intentioned; from those with knowledge and experience in the area, it is the most valuable. As it is well intentioned, it is meant to help and worth taking on board. From personal experience, it is important to see it as help not as a criticism. Finally, I can only know your audience by asking — and that involves sending something out for them to consider.
Thank you for reading and I hope this was of some use to you. If it was feedback is gratefully appreciated.
