In the past, I have had a tendency to be ok with good enough. It could have been for a variety of reasons. Whether it was not having the energy to go through the back and forth. My avoidance of conflict. Or worrying about the effort required to get it just right. I would settle. I remember always feeling slightly uneasy about it but not enough to keep pushing for what I thought was right.
That was until the end of 2024. I spent a lot of time during the holiday break reflecting on how I work. What was good. What could be better. One of the things that came up was to level up on quality. To worry about the details more. And not to give up so easily.
I’m happy to share that since coming back from the break, I have been putting a more concerted effort in fighting the good fight. There have been a number of instances already but one happened yesterday that felt really good. I’m really proud about it and the outcome we achieved.
I was brought in to review a change one of my engineering colleagues made. The work they did was good enough and in the past I might have just signed off on it. There were some minor details about it though that were off though.
So I dug in and worked really closely with the engineer. We had a number of back and forths. I felt bad asking them to keep tweaking the little detail we were working on. It just didn’t feel right. Good enough. But not right. I’d ask for a change. Try it out. And then shared more feedback. At one point, I even started proposing alternatives because I couldn’t leave it like that.
I’m glad the engineer stuck with the original idea and kept pushing through our ideal state. We eventually got it right. It worked and felt perfect! I thanked the engineer for their persistence. They thanked me back for the quick feedback loops and for sticking through it as well. I can’t speak for them but I think we were both proud about what we just did.
This was just the validation I needed to keep fighting the good fight. To ask more of the people around me. This time, there was no unease with settling. We got it right. I slept well last night not thinking about it.