Why Practice Doesn't Make Perfect

For you to get better and eventually remarkable at what you do, either as a working professional, entrepreneur, student or athlete, you know you must practice. But for some people, no matter how much they practice they remain average or even become worse. How can this be? Doesn't practice make perfect? No, practice does not make perfect.


Instead, "perfect practice" makes you close to perfect and all you have to be is close to become great.
Some of the greatest performers and business people in the world from Michael Jordan, Jerry Rice to Bill Gates, Michael Jackson did not become great by simply playing lots of basketball, football, selling products or singing. They got great by practicing on the specific skills, conditioning routines after hours, off the court, field and stage workouts/training. They performed "perfect practice." Perfect practice is when you spend ridiculous amounts of countless hours focusing on enhancing your strengths so that your weaknesses become irrelevant. However, it does not mean you ignore your weaknesses, but also spending time on them as well, if they are indeed limiting your performance.
For example, as a motivational speaker and trainer, I don't spend all my time speaking on stage to people and inspiring audiences. Instead, the majority of my time is spent on developing inspiring stories from experiences, ideas, writing articles and books to master my topics. I also spend hours grinding by working on my delivery in empty conference rooms, and developing and refining my marketing strategy. Those after hours and off the stage skills are what matters most.
As a working professional, think about the specific skills you need to work on to get to the next level in your career. Is it soft skills (communication, networking, leadership), presentation skills, or your professional brand?
As an entrepreneur, after developing a good quality product, don't spend all of your time focusing on making the product better, let the customers tell you how to make it better after you've continued to test it's potential in the marketplace. Spend your time marketing, story-selling, marketing, story-selling, marketing and developing a community around your product and brand.
Practice does not make you perfect, "perfect practice" gets you close to perfect, and all you have to be is close to perfect to be great at what you do. In business, "perfect practice" makes profit. Grind for Greatness!

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