Last week, I attended an entrepreneur event where the speaker shared some of his best practices for growing a successful startup. One thing he said really stuck with me: if you want to promote a culture where failure is accepted and independent thinking is encouraged, you must work to share stories internally in a public context that reinforce this message.
In this context, it’s not failure for the sake of failure, but failure in the pursuit of thoughtful risk-taking. At this particular startup, during their regular all-hands town halls, they would feature a team member as one of the speakers. That team member would be interviewed about a specific failure. The conversation would cover what the goals were, what the expectations were, why the initiative was pursued, why it didn’t work, and most importantly, what was learned from the experience.
At the end of the conversation, they would emphasize that this type of scenario—failure through thoughtful risk-taking—is encouraged at the company. The message was clear: failure for the sake of failure is not good, but failure in the context of thoughtful risk-taking is valuable.
Most companies and most people, by default, avoid admitting failure. As entrepreneurs and leaders, it’s important to acknowledge when things don’t work out and to set a standard that encourages thoughtful risk-taking, rather than discouraging it, as is common in many businesses.
For entrepreneurs, I recommend incorporating a failure segment into your regular all-hands meetings. This way, employees consistently hear the message that thoughtful risk-taking is encouraged. Celebrate the fact that the more you experiment and learn, the faster you grow, both as an individual and as a business.
Entrepreneur
via https://www.aiupnow.com
David Cummings, Khareem Sudlow
