September 9, 2011 69 Comments

The Difference Between Ship and Shit

JEEP Dispatcher assembly line

My language isn’t safe for work on this post. Save criticism for another post. In this case, I need to use this word.

Seth Godin is right to tell you to ship. Get your stuff out. Make something. DO something. It’s important. And waiting until something is perfect isn’t an option.

Putting out crap isn’t all that useful, either. There’s a big difference between “ship” and “shit,” and in the latter case, I’d say the difference is one you already know about in your gut.

The Balance

Let me be clear: it’s quite often okay to put out something that’s “good enough.” What isn’t okay is trying to get something out to your audience or community that just doesn’t get anything done. And by the way, the “it” in this case is whatever your “product” is. If it’s a blog post and you’ve just thrown it together, you know that. If it’s a speech, then writing it an hour before you give it is shit. If it’s a book and you’re just writing to fill pages, that’s shit.

You feeling this?

Restaurants make this mistake all the time. Servers do it all the time. People phone it in all the time. They have the chance to deliver something even vaguely good, and they push out what? You got it. Shit.

How Do You Manage It?

Here’s the thing, and I’m sorry to keep repeating, but people don’t read any longer. They skim.

You know when you’re pushing out shit versus shipping. You’ve got pressure to ship. Great. Then make the time to make it worth it. Don’t hold things until they’re perfect. That’s constipation, and serves no one.

If it’s something you know will help others, put it out. If it’s not ready to help others, don’t. If you haven’t completed it, wait. Do the work. Finish it. If you haven’t given it a quick polish, wait. If you haven’t garnished the plate, so to speak, wait.

Then ship it.

Seth didn’t ask for your poop. We can all do better. I’m on this same watch. You with me?

Related posts:

  1. When Pirates Board a New Ship
  2. Welcoming Colin Browning to the Pirate Ship
  3. Pirate Moves- Equip Your Ship
  4. Your Donations Really Made a Difference
  5. The Difference Between Recipe and Restaurant

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  • http://www.alspaulding.com Al Spaulding

    I was just going over this in my mind the other day. I just refuse to put out content via my blog that is not quality. I feel I have a responsibility not only to myself but to my readers as well to make sure that I don’t fling together some words and slap them on my blog just to have a quantity of content vs quality. Once again Chris, you find a way to slap reality into the face of the bullshitters out there in the blogosphere. Cheers!
    ~AL

  • Dan

    Go over your work once or twice looking for
    improvements before hitting send.  If the content is not worth saying,
    abandon all together (you can’t shine shit).  So
    very fundamental one may question weather the article passes the test.  In truth it does, when inundated or
    fatigued one may produce shit and feel pressure to respond, or produce.  If one is not up to doing his best,
    or at least adequate, delay rest return and complete.  Good advice. 

     

  • Resumesteve

    Not skimming what you and Seth are passionate about is shipping too especially when we share and we do…that’s shipping too.
    You got me; imperfect as I am.
    sQs  Delray Beach  – Shipping!

  • http://twitter.com/photosims Monica Sims

    I caught myself skimming your article when you mentioned it and then had to go back and re-read, but it did make me pay more attention. :)

    At times I feel that I’m reading long blog posts that are made long to meet a word requirement when most of the time, the point can be made in a lot less words, and then I’ll actually read it. If a post is too long, I give up even skimming. So don’t put out shit, but also, split up content into multiple posts if it’s getting too long. I don’t have time to read 50 tips on how to do something!

    Thanks for a great post, Chris.

  • http://twitter.com/martypdx Marty Nelson

    Love this line:

    “If it’s something you know will help others, put it out.”

    Great litmus test, appreciate the help!

  • http://thecontentcocktail.com Christina Pappas

    I just wrote about something similar the other day when I discovered a brand shipped half of the final product. What happened was that the fashion brand Express launched a digital catalog but when you tried to access it via smartphone, you received a message saying ‘coming soon.’ Not necessarily shit but certainly felt like I, as a smartphone user, was shit upon. That they didnt care enough about me to wait to release the thing until every single part of it was ready.

    Its interesting to think of your own stuff as shit – do we even know we are putting out shit? Many times I was ‘phoning it in’ on a blog post turned out to be some of the best blog posts ever. Is shit to me the same as shit to my audience? Hard to tell sometimes…

  • http://efttappingtechniques.com/about-natalie-hill/ Natalie Hill

    Love it.  

    Seems like shipping is just like promoting a healthy digestive tract.  Holding back leads to constipation.  Shit too much and you’ve got diarrhea.  

    Sometimes it’s hard to get it just right. At least it is for me. 

  • http://efttappingtechniques.com/about-natalie-hill/ Natalie Hill

    Love it.  

    Seems like shipping is just like promoting a healthy digestive tract.  Holding back leads to constipation.  Shit too much and you’ve got diarrhea.  

    Sometimes it’s hard to get it just right. At least it is for me. 

  • http://traffikd.com social traffic

    Unfortunately with a strong enough brand it stops mattering.  Question everything you are doing and buying, look for other options, research and be an aware consumer.  Our world is so interconnected and moves so quickly, use social media to express yourself and hear others expressions.

  • http://webpromoexpert.com seo company

    Thanks a lot for enjoying this beauty article with me. I am appreciating it very much!.

  • http://twitter.com/MattSearles Matt Searles

    I just want to point out the Bill Clinton often wrote speeches and hour before he gave them.. just saying

  • http://www.game-changer-dna.net/ Richard Bienvenu

    Ha, ha. Great post! How many times have we seen one of those generic niche websites with several paragraphs in order to show content to the search engines with obvious statements of generalizations that really don’t say anything.

    If one just writes conversationally and has something to say that can be useful or helpful to people and speaks from the heart it doesn’t have to be perfect. And it’s great content. Spending just minutes revising it can make all the difference in the world.

    Didn’t Lincoln write the Gettysburg Address on the back of an envelope? No one knows how long it actually took him to write it but I dare say he was formulating it in his mind before he put pen to paper.

  • http://giffconstable.com giffc

    If your product is an actual, new software product, there are times when you don’t know how much or how little it truly fits a need. Oh you hope, but you dont know for certain. What people say and do can be very different. So you ship. But you don’t hype. You learn. The tricky stuff here is not where something is awful or great, but in the messy middle.

  • http://www.i95dev.com Henry Louis

    I loved the ending part of this article. One has to decide for himself if the thing is ready or not. It helps not to repent at a later point of time.

  • scholarships for women

    Very true. My ex-boss always spoke in public without writing them at all and produced an effect that made me feel like vomiting. Also I know people pushing out shhhhhhhhhhhhh….. Anyway the post above is a good reminder of what we already know but do not wish to practice.

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