Without a doubt this is one of the best posts I’ve read in a long time.  Mary Schmidt discusses situational excellence.  I remember in one of my first jobs out of college, Roy Catignani explaining to me “Keep your eyes on the cheese.”  I’ve seen many a project hamstrung by issues that had little or no real impact on the project or the end deliverable. 

Remember, in web projects 80% is a good rule of thumb – if you’ve got 80%, the other 20% probably is not noticable to anyone but you.  Pick the last 20% up after go live.

A list from Mary that’s worthy of reciting at the beginning of every project meeting:

Before you go and spend a gazillion dollars on something slick (commercial, brochure, logo, slogan, artificially induced “viral” marketing) – ask yourself:

1. Is our (and/or our CEO’s) definition of “excellent” the same as our customers?

2. Do our customers care? (Or, are we blowing dollars on our own ego strokes?)

3. Will they even notice? (A pantone shade never closed a deal.)

4. Can the dollars better be spent on walking the talk, versus coming up with “better” talk? Example: That BoA YouTube singer.