How to Fail Successfully

There is a lot of truth in the quote: ‘failures are our greatest teachers’.  In fact, failure can play a key part in our ultimate successes.  It’s almost impossible to achieve something without having a few bumps along the road.   Learning to accept that our failures are part of our journey to success is important as it allows us to stay motivated.

The unexpected ‘curveballs’ that are thrown your way force you to adapt and adjust so that you don’t end up completely off track. Importantly, from these curveballs, you learn and grow, and figure out how to overcome barriers so you can move forward.

So, if failure is so key to personal and professional growth and development, how can you ensure that you fail successfully?

Here are some top tips on how to use your failures to your advantage.

Think About the Future, Not Just the Past

Once you have had the opportunity to reflect on what went wrong, it’s time to think about how you can make changes for the future.  How can you use your new knowledge to help meet future goals?   By reframing past setbacks as opportunities to improve future outcomes you are developing the ability to think critically, productively and creatively.

Make Small Changes

When you fail, you might think that you need to completely switch up your routine if you want to succeed in the future. But it’s often just one or two small factors that contributed to your failure.

To fail successfully, you need to identify which aspects of your plan went wrong, so that you can make the necessary changes. Maybe one small decision led to a number of other things going wrong.

Lots of small changes will add up to a large difference, which may lead you down the right path to success.

Obtain Feedback

One of the most important things to do when you fail is to gather feedback. Whether you ask for friends’ thoughts on your situation or you get your employees to write their feedback down, this can be an important step for learning new insights.

You can also ask them for their advice and guidance. How do they think you can move forward from this point? Remember to turn to those whom you trust and whose opinions you value.