Want to succeed as a creator?

Quality vs quantity: an experiment

There was a famous experiment that took place in the University of Florida. It’s mentioned in many books about creativity, usually told as a story about a pottery class.

The professor divided the class into two. He told one half that their grade for the semester would depend on making just one perfect pot, and that it was their job to ensure it was of the very best quality. The other half, he said, would be graded on quantity. He would award the highest grades to the students who made the most work, during the term. Their finished work would be weighed, but not judged.

I’ve always had a very vivid picture of what happened that term. Half of the students carefully considering what they might make, pressuring themselves to be perfect, I can imagine them rejecting every pot they throw and sending very little to be fired in the kiln. The other half, meanwhile, would be gleefully making and making, experimenting and playing, finishing pot after pot.

You can probably guess the punchline.

It was the group who were concentrating on quantity who also made the most beautiful pots. It’s obvious, really. If you want to get good at something, you need to practice. A lot. And preferably without your inner critic, or your perfectionist getting in the way by fearfully screaming that it’s not good enough. (As well as helpfully reminding you that you will never be good enough.)

In truth, this experiment didn’t happen in a ceramics class at all. It was a Beginning Photography course led by Jerry Uelsmann, way before digital cameras made it easy to produce lots of images quickly and cheaply. The story was popularised in Art And Fear, a book about creativity written by two photographers, David Bayles and Ted Orland. They decided too many of the examples they cited involved their medium, so they changed it to a pottery class.

I like it better as a photography story.

I’ve met a lot of experienced, talented photographers recently, who are cautiously starting to use Instagram as a shop window. But they’re editing their grids with all the care and meticulous attention to detail that they would put into a nine-page magazine story.

They’re perfecting every flaw, making sure each picture they post flows or contrasts beautifully with the one they posted before, and the one they post after. They’re crafting perfect captions and spending hours on something most of their followers will scroll past, in seconds.

Instagram can be a great tool for showcasing your work. But no one is expecting everything you post there to be polished and perfect. It’s not what that particular platform is for.

This is a challenge for most creators.

We all have times when we focus too much on the quality, when what we just need to do is press on, and get our ideas down.

I am currently coaching a brilliant writer working on her first novel. Except she keeps stalling on chapter five and going back to fix problems she perceives with the structure, or a character’s backstory.

Then there’s a songwriter friend. A major music publisher had invited him to send three samples of his work, which could be exactly the breakthrough he’d been looking for.

That was four months ago. He’s recorded and rerecorded possible songs ever since. But he insists they’re still not ready to send. He’s currently saving to pay for a better studio, to record and mix them all again.

The curse of perfectionism.

As I’ve written before, I’m a recovering perfectionist. But it’s a hard habit to kick. I’ve been working on a series of useful little books for creatives, each exploring a different aspect of the creative life, with tools and exercises that I know are effective. I was intending to make them short and easy to read, useful without being overwhelming.

But the first one has grown into a full-length book, and I’ve spent most of the past year tweaking and polishing it, and making the whole thing a far bigger job than it was supposed to be. Especially when I’m not even sure anyone actually wants it. It was supposed to be a fun experiment. And I’ve turned it into a Herculean task.

I’m telling you all this because I happened to be on Instagram this week — scrolling as a form of procrastination from that very book — when I found a series of pictures by British artist Rich Wells. Including a collage in which he declared: “Make more, care less.” It felt like exactly what many of us need to hear. Including me.

Make more, care less

This seems a good guiding principle, for creators. When talking about this in the past, I’ve often mentioned slogans from the early days of Facebook.

• Done is better than perfect.
• Move fast and break things.

They can be useful. But the elephant in the room — or the Zuckerberg at the congressional hearing — is that many of us wish the social media barons had spent more time considering the consequences of what they were unleashing.

They moved fast and what they broke was society, our children’s mental health, our respect for science, research, objective truth. They unwittingly built a machine that amplifies extreme opinions, makes fake news seem equal to real news, and allows trolls to spew bile and hate behind a protective screen of anonymity. What’s more, they don’t seem in any great hurry to fix those errors.

I prefer “Make more, care less”, because it doesn’t say don’t care at all. I love my creative clients because they’re professionals. They have high standards. They care, deeply, about what they do. And that’s important. We all want to make work that has meaning, depth, that educates or inspired, that makes people feel something.

But we should also keep the end goal in mind.

Sometimes high standards are important. Other times, it really is more about quantity, about doing something consistently and getting out of our own way. If you’re a photographer posting on Instagram, for instance, is the real aim to have a perfect grid? Or are you trying to get feedback on new work, to attract more paying clients, or to build a community who might be interested in buying your books or your photography workshops?

With all of the above, posting regularly and connecting authentially is far more important than perfecting every pixel.

Sometimes, it’s OK to be messy, imperfect.

In fact there are times when that’s the whole point. Whether it’s a book draft, showing your work in progress, an IG feed or some songs, there’s a time to polish, hone and perfect. And there’s a time to just make more, and care less.

When writing a novel, in the first draft you’re exploring your story, creating a world. Things will happen in chapter 20 that mean you have to tweak the action back in chapter 4, so there’s no point perfecting each bit, before you move forward. That’s for your second draft — and all the many, many edits and versions that follow.

A publisher wants songs so they can offer them to other artists. Or help you get signed to a record label in your own right. Then the quality of the recording becomes key. Before, it’s all about the strength of the songs. And they can only judge my friend’s excellent music if he sends it.

As for me, I’m given myself a strict deadline for finishing this book, in July. And I’m putting it out in September, imperfections and all. This series is not meant to be great literature, that wins prizes. They’re meant to be helpful. But my little books can only be useful if I get the information I’ve learned from years of working with brilliant creatives out of my head, onto the page and out there.

How about you?

What would you create this year, if you aimed to make more, and care just a little less?

***

Sheryl Garratt is a writer, and a coach helping experienced creatives of all kinds get the success they want, making work they truly love. If you’re ready to grow your creative business, I have a FREE 10-day course giving you 10 steps to success — with less stress. Sign up for it here.