Why Productive Failures are a Good Thing

I think of that interview between Eric Ries of the Lean Startup and Darren Hardy of Success Magazine  who discussed how most employees want to keep their jobs, so upon their annual reviews, they tend to hide or cover their failures. I can totally understand that. There’s a lot of fear, around losing jobs in a time where jobs seem scarce, which is a valid concern. Failures are completely deemphasized or not mentioned at all.

On the other hand, that’s not good for business either. People are human and there needs to be some margin for error. The stress shouldn’t be about the failure as an end in itself, but what did you do about it? Because by identifying the problem, you could come up with a solution and everyone can learn from the mistakes.

What I found enlightening was mention of a company that actually WANTS employees to discuss one productive failure and how they fixed it and mention that in an employee review. (Sorry, I gotta listen to that interview again and find the name!) If only there were more companies or organizations in general that had that mentality.

Going off on a tangent, I was actually at my son’s classmate’s party yesterday, and a parent and I got into a conversation on the school system. Most school districts in general seem pretty good for the most part, but like in the work place, they don’t allow much room for error. You’re also expected to perform. It basically comes down to how good of a test taker are you and can you think like the test maker? Because quite frankly, what you learn in school doesn’t directly apply to life in the real world (unless you’re in a super specialized field). That’s why some parents choose home schooling as an option, like Penelope Trunk.

I would say keeping a post-mortem on lessons learned after a project or bump in the road is the best way to learn, at least for yourself in business or school because that’s good for overall personal growth because at least internally, even on an individual level because when we acknowledge our errors and mistakes, we empower ourselves and frankly that’s the best way to learn.