Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of intelligent effort.

Effort alone does not produce quality, and plenty of people work extremely hard while producing something mediocre with great sincerity. Intelligent is the word carrying the load: effort that has been aimed, informed by what went wrong last time and by what good actually looks like. That requires knowing the standard, which is why time spent studying excellent examples is not a detour.

Before the next piece of work, look closely at something very good in the same line. Name two specific things it does, then try to do those rather than simply trying harder.