The first draft is rarely good.
The second draft isn’t much to look at either. Although the logic is starting to take shape, the piece is yet to sing.
At this point, we’ve usually run out of time, and the deadline forces us to hit send.
Yet if we baked in a little more time—enough for a third draft, or maybe even a fourth—we would’ve got to a level of simplicity, clarity, and thoughtfulness achieved by few others.
Few people are patient enough to hang around until the third draft. What are they missing out on?