My boss is repeatedly providing me the feedback that I am doing my job with the perfection 99% but not with the perfection of 100%.
Can you please advise me upon how to achieve that 1%? I take care of company India operations.
From India, Thana
3Can you please advise me upon how to achieve that 1%? I take care of company India operations.
From India, Thana
Dear friend,
Before commenting on the your question, let me go to the last line of your post. It says that you take care of your company's India operations. Interpretations of this sentence can be that you must be a senior person and many managers could be reporting to you.
Many times juniors leave out finer details in their work and when these are noticed by some senior authority, they bring it to the junior's attention. Unfortunately, what you are supposed to do with your juniors is still done to you by your seniors. Your boss says that you put up efforts to be perfect 99% but that gap of 1% could be nullifying or negating your entire efforts. Your boss says so because people are rewarded for the results and not for the efforts.
In this context, let me give you one of the best quotes on perfectionism. It says:
perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.
- Vince Lombardi
In India, chalta hai attitude in ingrained in our blood. This attitude is antithesis of quality orientation. Today we come across with votaries of why one should not be perfect. It is plain rationalisation and teaches to be self-complacent. If Japanese would not have regarded perfectionism, then Japan would not have been Japan. Quality is not just a word for but it has almost become synonym for Japan. They could develop this synonym because of their unflinching faith on the quality. Our flights or trains reach late. We regret or grumble for a while and move on. It does not drive a sense of shame in us because we are taught to be imperfect. We are dismissive of ourselves and we have a firm view that we are born to sing paeans of countries like Japan or mighty companies like FedEx, Sony etc who are considered as pinnacle of the quality.
My question to those who rationalise with being imperfect is that will they accept mobile phone or TV set that works with 99% perfection? These perfectly working instruments or gadgets are working with 100% perfection because people to develop them also work with 100% perfection. There is no room for 99% perfection!
Now coming to the solution. It is going to be onerous task for you to reach level of 100% As much time and efforts you had put up to reach 99% same efforts could be required to reach 100% To attain this level, you need to have unwavering consistency.
Hereafter, audit your work or have a critical review before it goes further. Visualise sequence of the events that you are going to pass through and find out whether you have equipped yourself with paraphernalia required for the job. Keep yourself sufficiently informed about the task that you are going to undertake. Draw a sketch or process map of every task and identify who are the primary parties and who are the secondary parties in this task. Find out whether they are informed adequately or they have sufficient resources.
You are lucky enough to have gracious boss. Possibly any other boss would not be as generous as the current one who says that you handle 99% tasks perfectly. Your post is too short. Neither you have given any background nor introduction. Shortness of your post bespeaks what you are! Your post hardly behoves your position of Head - India Operations!
All the best!
Dinesh Divekar
From India, Bangalore
Before commenting on the your question, let me go to the last line of your post. It says that you take care of your company's India operations. Interpretations of this sentence can be that you must be a senior person and many managers could be reporting to you.
Many times juniors leave out finer details in their work and when these are noticed by some senior authority, they bring it to the junior's attention. Unfortunately, what you are supposed to do with your juniors is still done to you by your seniors. Your boss says that you put up efforts to be perfect 99% but that gap of 1% could be nullifying or negating your entire efforts. Your boss says so because people are rewarded for the results and not for the efforts.
In this context, let me give you one of the best quotes on perfectionism. It says:
perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.
- Vince Lombardi
In India, chalta hai attitude in ingrained in our blood. This attitude is antithesis of quality orientation. Today we come across with votaries of why one should not be perfect. It is plain rationalisation and teaches to be self-complacent. If Japanese would not have regarded perfectionism, then Japan would not have been Japan. Quality is not just a word for but it has almost become synonym for Japan. They could develop this synonym because of their unflinching faith on the quality. Our flights or trains reach late. We regret or grumble for a while and move on. It does not drive a sense of shame in us because we are taught to be imperfect. We are dismissive of ourselves and we have a firm view that we are born to sing paeans of countries like Japan or mighty companies like FedEx, Sony etc who are considered as pinnacle of the quality.
My question to those who rationalise with being imperfect is that will they accept mobile phone or TV set that works with 99% perfection? These perfectly working instruments or gadgets are working with 100% perfection because people to develop them also work with 100% perfection. There is no room for 99% perfection!
Now coming to the solution. It is going to be onerous task for you to reach level of 100% As much time and efforts you had put up to reach 99% same efforts could be required to reach 100% To attain this level, you need to have unwavering consistency.
Hereafter, audit your work or have a critical review before it goes further. Visualise sequence of the events that you are going to pass through and find out whether you have equipped yourself with paraphernalia required for the job. Keep yourself sufficiently informed about the task that you are going to undertake. Draw a sketch or process map of every task and identify who are the primary parties and who are the secondary parties in this task. Find out whether they are informed adequately or they have sufficient resources.
You are lucky enough to have gracious boss. Possibly any other boss would not be as generous as the current one who says that you handle 99% tasks perfectly. Your post is too short. Neither you have given any background nor introduction. Shortness of your post bespeaks what you are! Your post hardly behoves your position of Head - India Operations!
All the best!
Dinesh Divekar
From India, Bangalore
Dear Friend,
Adding to what Mr. Divekar has already said, i would also suggest that can you ask your manager, as to where he feels that you need to improve? Many a times, we assume that our reporting is what our boss needs, in reality, he may want you to add that extra mile... So be open, ask him for a frank feedback and take the feedback sportingly, without any side effects or biases...
So instead of assumption, ask, unlearn a few learning and relearn a few old ones... Asking will help you go beyond the 99% and closer to 1% as you will have a direction and can work upon them... Also, you could the analysis of the corrections that your boss does on your work and work towards achieving them before hand...
Regards,
From India, Mumbai
Adding to what Mr. Divekar has already said, i would also suggest that can you ask your manager, as to where he feels that you need to improve? Many a times, we assume that our reporting is what our boss needs, in reality, he may want you to add that extra mile... So be open, ask him for a frank feedback and take the feedback sportingly, without any side effects or biases...
So instead of assumption, ask, unlearn a few learning and relearn a few old ones... Asking will help you go beyond the 99% and closer to 1% as you will have a direction and can work upon them... Also, you could the analysis of the corrections that your boss does on your work and work towards achieving them before hand...
Regards,
From India, Mumbai
Dear colleague,
Your post lacks vital information. What is the business of your company?, What is your exact role and what are the deliverables expected of you?.
Since your boss says you achieve 99% and lack 1% perfection, indicates that there are well-defined measurable performance goals in place. As Ashutosh has stated ,find out what this 1% lack is due to from your boss and focus only on that to reach 100% perfection as defined in your performance evaluation system.
My gut feel is your boss is trying to bring out best in you by pointing to 1% lack in your achievement.
Regards
Vinayak Nagarkar
HR-Consultant.
From India, Mumbai
Your post lacks vital information. What is the business of your company?, What is your exact role and what are the deliverables expected of you?.
Since your boss says you achieve 99% and lack 1% perfection, indicates that there are well-defined measurable performance goals in place. As Ashutosh has stated ,find out what this 1% lack is due to from your boss and focus only on that to reach 100% perfection as defined in your performance evaluation system.
My gut feel is your boss is trying to bring out best in you by pointing to 1% lack in your achievement.
Regards
Vinayak Nagarkar
HR-Consultant.
From India, Mumbai
First, thank you Mr. Dinesh Divekar for allowing me to provide some inputs.
Hi Appleboycat, the question is very interesting. Just to provide my opinion:
Nobody's perfect --Humans can never be perfect. Even technology has its flaws. Perfection is a dream, and reality is it will never happen. But close to perfection -YES! Perfect is best (of course) but being Done is better than being best. There are some of few professionals who may be too much talented that they want a project to be perfect. By doing so, they tend to lose hope and patience because they can't reach that 100% perfection. At the end of the day, they fail and leave the project undone/incomplete. What I am saying here is you can aim for perfection, you can plan it to be perfect in every way you think possible. But not being done with it, that you worked on for a very long time, will mean only that you're a failure -so where's being perfect there? If you keep on trying to be 100% perfect, you cannot finish. But if you reach the goal you need to accomplish, that is way better. There will always be room for improvements -get a survey and feedback of the project in order to improve it. There is a word called "revision", so when you make policies and it somehow do not fit then you revise it until it satisfies your audience. I am not saying that you cannot put an excellent job. That job may not be perfect but you finished the job, and this alone is an excellent job. You will say to yourself that "Yes, I did it, my team and I did it! It's not perfect but my boss loved it!" This is what you call DONE.
On the other, ask for the reasons in which area your boss did not like. Then work on improvements on the way to perfection --99.99% is good anyway! Please don't ask where is that 0.01%. Just remember, it's better not to be perfect but done. Best of luck to you! ;-)
From Bangladesh, Dhaka
Hi Appleboycat, the question is very interesting. Just to provide my opinion:
Nobody's perfect --Humans can never be perfect. Even technology has its flaws. Perfection is a dream, and reality is it will never happen. But close to perfection -YES! Perfect is best (of course) but being Done is better than being best. There are some of few professionals who may be too much talented that they want a project to be perfect. By doing so, they tend to lose hope and patience because they can't reach that 100% perfection. At the end of the day, they fail and leave the project undone/incomplete. What I am saying here is you can aim for perfection, you can plan it to be perfect in every way you think possible. But not being done with it, that you worked on for a very long time, will mean only that you're a failure -so where's being perfect there? If you keep on trying to be 100% perfect, you cannot finish. But if you reach the goal you need to accomplish, that is way better. There will always be room for improvements -get a survey and feedback of the project in order to improve it. There is a word called "revision", so when you make policies and it somehow do not fit then you revise it until it satisfies your audience. I am not saying that you cannot put an excellent job. That job may not be perfect but you finished the job, and this alone is an excellent job. You will say to yourself that "Yes, I did it, my team and I did it! It's not perfect but my boss loved it!" This is what you call DONE.
On the other, ask for the reasons in which area your boss did not like. Then work on improvements on the way to perfection --99.99% is good anyway! Please don't ask where is that 0.01%. Just remember, it's better not to be perfect but done. Best of luck to you! ;-)
From Bangladesh, Dhaka
Dear Friend,
" I AM going to say here one thing, Hanuman did not know his strength, the word RAMA bring the perfection" Let we forget whether he is monkey, god or human race, and Arjuna knows how to shoot, just he "concentrated" the eye of the bird nothing else.
In both the cases, the strength and the power(motivation), digesting/becoming the one, becoming the goal alone gave the perfection.
Do the work without slightest doubt, control the emotions, become the one of becoming the goal, put the passion into the work, see the result. You will certainly have achieved the 100%, the 1% will always remain a distance dream, sometimes the 1% deficiency will haunt us like a ghost. Coming to Shri Dinesh Divekar statement "Chalta Hai" attitude and taking the things granted lead us to imperfection, because of diversified culture, regional alienation we tend to go imperfection.
From India, Arcot
" I AM going to say here one thing, Hanuman did not know his strength, the word RAMA bring the perfection" Let we forget whether he is monkey, god or human race, and Arjuna knows how to shoot, just he "concentrated" the eye of the bird nothing else.
In both the cases, the strength and the power(motivation), digesting/becoming the one, becoming the goal alone gave the perfection.
Do the work without slightest doubt, control the emotions, become the one of becoming the goal, put the passion into the work, see the result. You will certainly have achieved the 100%, the 1% will always remain a distance dream, sometimes the 1% deficiency will haunt us like a ghost. Coming to Shri Dinesh Divekar statement "Chalta Hai" attitude and taking the things granted lead us to imperfection, because of diversified culture, regional alienation we tend to go imperfection.
From India, Arcot
Well, many people use the word "perfect" interchangably for excellence. So my take is that rather than go down that path of perfection-vs-excellence, to address the issue, I would recommend, as someone suggested earlier, to go back to your boss and ask him to share his thoughts. Ask for SPECIFIC instances of where he feels you could step up.
As a third person, I am severely limited - from the two lines that you have shared, I may be able to think of a million reasons why that 1% may be missed but only your Boss would be having his finger exactly on the pulse.
Sometimes even your guessing may be wrong, what your boss feels is lacking could be a genuine 'blind spot' to you. Best to ask him not from a place of feeling emotional but with complete earnestness, from a place of "I would like to improve and do my best so would request your valuable feedback for my personal growth and performance". I hope this helps, in any case,you are in a GOOD place (already 99% there is an achievement!) All the best with the 1%!
From India, Chennai
As a third person, I am severely limited - from the two lines that you have shared, I may be able to think of a million reasons why that 1% may be missed but only your Boss would be having his finger exactly on the pulse.
Sometimes even your guessing may be wrong, what your boss feels is lacking could be a genuine 'blind spot' to you. Best to ask him not from a place of feeling emotional but with complete earnestness, from a place of "I would like to improve and do my best so would request your valuable feedback for my personal growth and performance". I hope this helps, in any case,you are in a GOOD place (already 99% there is an achievement!) All the best with the 1%!
From India, Chennai
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