Perfection can be the antithesis to success.

Many of you may call BS on that statement. You might say something like, “But what about companies like Apple, Google, and Tesla? Aren’t they constantly perfecting their products?”

You’re right, they are. But the intent of my statement is towards the average human being and not towards the corporate behemoths that have the resources to build the perfect product from the get-go.

For us, shipping is essential because if we don’t, we’ll never get real-life feedback. And if we delay getting feedback, then we’ll never know if what we’re doing is working or not.

This is why perfection can be the antithesis to success. It paralyzes us and creates the illusion that we’re making progress, when in actuality, progress is validating the product ideas with users.

Even when we think a product is done, it’s never ever finished. In the spirit of kaizen, a product can be forever tweaked and improved upon.

So don’t let the fear or discomfort of imperfection stop you from shipping. There’s always certainty in releasing an imperfect product that can be perfected afterwards, but there’s little to no certainty in releasing a product when it’s truly done.

Accordingly, it makes more sense to rephrase the earlier statement to perfection can be the antithesis to getting things done. I can attest to this because this post has been sitting in my drafts folder since last year.