Professional graffiti
How about a nice comfy couch in a Danish modern style? (Photo by Vincent Ciro)
I'm delighted by the prehistoric humans who drew and painted on their cave walls so long ago. Through their art, we can connect with them and learn from them across millennia.
I tolerate the humans who tag bus shelters and train stations with spray paint and carve their names into trees in an arguably less attractive and archaeologically significant way of saying, "I was here."
Clearly, as a species, we enjoy putting our own stamp on things. We like to leave a record of our existence, whether for those who we currently share the planet with or those who will come later. That's a key purpose of art, and also, I suppose, of social media.
I've been wondering lately whether this impulse to make our mark is a factor in overly complicated operations, bloated bureaucracy, and creative projects that lose their way.
If I'm handed a document to edit and I don't make a single change to it, have I actually edited it?
If I take over a role and don't change a single thing that my predecessor did, have I contributed anything?
If I'm provided the opportunity to give feedback and I don't find anything to fix, have I tried hard enough?
And is it enough to strip things away and simplify, or must I add something?
It seems like some of us, to justify our participation, feel that we have to add or create things.
This is the flip side of no one taking responsibility for a shared problem — the piece of trash that ten people walk by before someone deals with it. This is what happens when those ten people all want to give their input into something or have a hand in the creation of something.
That collaboration could go great if the focus is truly on making the film, process, manuscript, or rocket launch better. But if a participant is trying to make sure they're earning their paycheck, seeks to be recognized for their talent or ambition, or wants to be able to point to something and say, like little Michael Banks in Mary Poppins, "That's the part I put in!", there will be a problem.
In other words, if I'm focused on myself instead of the work, the outcome will suffer.
The solution, then, is to focus on the work. What will make this better, and how are we defining "better"?
It's useful to consider the words of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry here: "Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away." And once we reach that point, we can stop tinkering and leave the sales copy, meeting agenda, or haircut alone.
I believe it takes more confidence to make no tweaks to something than it does to tweak. To let something pass without further comment is a way of saying, "This is good enough, and I cannot make it better." It's understandable why, in a professional context, we'd want to instead attempt to make improvements. However, this might amount to no more than graffiti -- a way to claim territory for ourselves.
When we care enough about a project to want to do a good job on it, we'll bring all kinds of ideas. Not all of them will make the end product better, even if they're ours. Our most valuable contribution might be to recognize that something is just right exactly the way we found it.
