Coping with Failure and Learning from Mistakes

I taught college for 25 years, which led me to recognizing the same type of questions that came up in nearly every class, nearly every semester, sometime during the term. The thing is, so many of those questions were not simply about getting a college education, but lifelong learning and self-improvement. I sometimes gave advice until I was blue in the face, only to hear the same question again.

So here I go again!

Failure

Too often, students asked about “failure,” because they did not receive the grade they wanted, or they experienced that in another class or their workplace. First of all, looking at evaluations in black-and-white terms is not only inaccurate, but unhealthy. Very little (if anything) in the world is black-and-white; the vast majority of things are shades of gray. So receiving an unsatisfactory grade on an assignment or in an evaluation at work is not failure, nor was it intended to say, “You failed!” (Even if the grade received was an F; or E in today’s world, where it’s too hard to endure an actual F.) The grade was intended to tell you where the bar is, and give you an idea where this particular piece of work compares to the expected level of performance. So this perceived “failure” is not permanent, by any means.

Journey vs. Destination

Winston Churchill said, “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” That really sums it up. If you don’t receive the grade or evaluation you wanted, suck it up, take it as ut was intended, learn from it, make improvements, and move forward. In other words, this is an example of the journey being more important than the destination. Who better to exemplify that lesson than the man who led Great Britain through the turmoil of World War II?

Long View vs. Immediate

Here is another thought: if all you received was praise, what incentive would you have to improve? While success can feel good and make you feel like you accomplished something, it can also lead to complacency. If a person is always leading the pack, what reason does he have to improve?

Here is another way of looking at it. Albert Einstein said, “Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value.” In particular, when things seem to be so focused on the superficial, this statement shifts focus to the longer view, which will endure the test of time. In other words, real success comes in terms of intrinsic value, which is not whether something was a success at the time.

Learning and Leadership

Abraham Lincoln said, “I’m a success today because I had a friend who believed in me and I didn’t have the heart to let him down.” This statement is not just about success, but about leadership.

In my years of teaching, it became more and more clear that students did not understand (or even realize) that leadership and learning and inseparable. A true leader is someone who learns continuously, who is open to new ideas, even to learning the skill of leadership itself.

Success Has Its Own Schedule

Henry David Thoreau said, “I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.” There is a lot that could be interpreted from this statement, ranging from the benefits of disconnecting from the world of social media (applying it to a current context) to the vast multitude of writers, artists, and inventors who flourished late in life simply because it’s never too late.

The thing that I always got from this (and seems to prove itself out in my life) is that success comes at times when it is not expected, from directions I never anticipated, but I would not have been able to take advantage of those opportunities if the foundations had not first been laid. For example, during the telecom boom, I worked for the biggest prepaid-phone card company in the country, called JDS. As happens with booms, there is the inevitable bust. The company exploded, then imploded, and I was laid off. I was still in a kind of shock from what had happened and went to the post office to send something (I was out of stamps) and the lines were exceptionally long. When I got to the front, the postal worked went into a sales pitch about prepaid phone cards, which started with, “Have you heard anything about prepaid phone cards?” It felt like a kick to the stomach. So I said, “Have you heard of JDS?” She just stared at me, but a man three lines over jumped up in the air so I could see his face over people’s heads, and yelled over the noise, “I have! I’ll be right over there!” So I finished and walked over to find him waiting. I introduced myself and he knew who I was, because I had been writing articles in the prepaid-telecom trade press, and told me he wanted me to interview for a job with his company. I asked what position and he said that there was not one, but they would create one, and gave me his business card. So I did, I interviewed, they created a position for me, and I was hired as their director of marketing.

Education Never Loses Value

That success came out of nowhere, and the foundation was there for me to capitalize, due to my education (BA in communication with a journalism emphasis) and my experience at JDS. Even though I only spent a short time as a full-time journalist before moving into the public-relations/marketing field (face it, I wanted to make more money), that education was invaluable to my career.

Writing Advice

Author Interview

Education Advice: Twenty-Five Tips for College Survival (And Excellence)

Education Advice: Learn Everything You Can

Education Advice: Never Stop Learning

Education Advice: A Lifelong Endeavor

Education Advice: A Look Through Others' Eyes

Education Advice: Education Is a Lifelong Pursuit

Education Advice: Set Yourself Up to Succeed

Education Advice: Silver Bullets for Your Public Speaking Gun