No organization is perfect

You see it on Facebook with other people, and on LinkedIn with other companies – “wow, they have everything together”.

We’ve learned over the years that a perfectly manicured Facebook feed often isn’t very truthful, but it can be trickier to see that in other organizations. If you see a group that puts out good work, is constantly growing, and is frequently praised in the community, it’s hard not to think they’ve got it all figured out. There are some amazing organizations out there, no doubt, but no one has it all together.

There are two levels to this, both shared in the book “Integrity“. The first is that no person or organization is perfect:

You have to get over the fantasy that there are perfectly “together” people and join the community of growers, whereby we all realize that we are humans who all have a “next step” to take in our growth.

We all have talents, even superhuman ones at times, and weaknesses and dysfunctions. The trick is to embrace those and become people and organizations that have a mentality of “imperfect stars who are getting better.”

The best organizations already know this. They know they’re doing great things, but they keep striving to get better.

The second level is watching out for organizations that work hard to put a completely false front. It’s one thing to showcase your strong areas, but it’s another to take it to the level of being misleading. Also from the book:

If people are really narcissistic or have a need to be seen as more than they really are, or to be admired as having it all together, then they cannot be followed and trusted by others.

It can be a fine line. You certainly want to put your best foot forward, but you absolutely don’t want to be intentionally misleading.

The takeaway is to not get discouraged when you see other organizations that are “perfect”, as we know that they’ve not found the full answer either. Keep working, keep improving, and keep that mentality of “imperfect stars who are getting better”.