When is it good enough? It’s a question we all wrestle with from time to time.

Perfectionism is the enemy of progress. Many businesses stall because they chase the perfect strategy, system, or decision, only to realise they’ve spent months planning while more agile competitors are already ahead.

So what is a better approach? Test. Learn. Improve. Repeat.

Thomas Edison famously tested 2,000 versions before perfecting the light bulb. Each small step he took was an incremental development on the previous design iteration. Then he retested.  Lighting innovation didn’t stop with Edison. Since then, we’ve seen all kinds of lighting: arc lights, xenon, lasers, fluorescents, LEDs, and more. His breakthrough was just one step in an ongoing evolution. But let’s look at how this applies in business.

Successful businesses like Amazon thrive on continuous testing. They run small experiments, evaluate results, and refine them. Whether on their website, pricing, or customer experience. A/B testing is also a standard in marketing, but can we and do we apply this mindset elsewhere?

Instead of spending weeks crafting what we think is the perfect campaign, we launch two variations, measure the results, and refine them based on actual data. We use the one that works better, then repeat.

Frequent, small changes accelerate learning and growth. Without this iterative approach, Amazon’s success would have been much slower.

Now, imagine applying that mindset across your business:
✅ Sales Strategies – Instead of overhauling your entire pitch, test small changes in messaging, pricing, or follow-up timing. See what works, then scale.
✅ Operational Efficiency – Want to improve team productivity? Trial a new workflow on a small scale, gather feedback and tweak it before rolling it out company-wide.
✅ Leadership & Culture – Need better engagement? Experiment with different meeting formats, feedback loops, or incentives. Learn what truly drives motivation before making sweeping changes. Ask for input.

The secret to long-term success isn’t waiting until you have everything figured out, it’s constant iteration.

What should we do?
1) Identify a small change and implement it
2) Measure and evaluate results.
3) Identify a follow-up improvement and retest.
Repeat

Where in your business could you apply this approach today?

#BusinessGrowth #ContinuousImprovement #Leadership #Strategy #Experimentation