Have a good career, be in shape, have good social skills.... these arn't "impossible standards", they are very reasonable for any man to strive to achieve.

Men's self-improvement should not be geared towards romantic prospects, they are basic self-care endeavours that a man should attain regardless of he's looking for a relationship or not; self-improvement is just bare minimum adult behavior. And if some men claim that they would accept a woman who does not pro-actively engage in any self-improvement, then I can only conclude that women, on average, respect themselves better than men do.

Men have much high testoserone levels than women, and this causes then to have stronger sex drives. Men often seek women for short-term flings, and the latter is often more interested in serious commitment. Yes I'm generalizing, but when analyzing the data of preferences, you will notice clear differences in the romantic intentions of both genders.

Men's desire for meaningless pump-and-dump action, more so than women do, is what drives them to have terribly low standards. And of course this would lead to a false conclusion that women "have much higher dating standards than men do".

Self-improvement is basic adult behavior, one should not do that just for bed-action. The amount of men who are willing to put up with nasty socially-inept and unkept women just to get laid is what leads them to conclude that women are pickier than men, when that really is not the case.