This week marked ‘International Day for Failure’, which I didn’t celebrate but I probably should have (as we all should have). Every successful leader I know has failed at something - and regularly. Whether they call it that or not is a conversation for another post…
Failure is often positioned as learning, but when something doesn’t go the way we’d have liked it to, when we don’t get the work we wanted, a conversation goes sideways - it still stings and it doesn’t necessarily feel like a good lesson. But these are exactly the instances that help to build resilience.
Image: Michael Dziedzic, unsplash
The myth of resilience - and what actually builds it
There’s been so much talk about resilience over the last few years that, as a term, it’s possibly lost some of its impact and meaning. And a lot of that I think is due to it being positioned as a trait - something you have or you don’t. But it definitely isn’t a trait - it’s built through what happens after something doesn’t go to plan.
As an example, teams don’t get stronger just because things are tough. They get stronger because they have permission to talk about what didn’t work without fearing blame or judgement. And this really matters.
Don’t underestimate this. If you want your people to take smart risks, experiment and stay engaged through change, they have to see that it’s safe to fail and recover - and talk about it. That’s the way that individual and organisational resilience grows.
A question for you
When was the last time you talked to your team about something that didn’t go to plan, not as a ‘lesson learned,’ but just to show that it’s okay to fail and move forward, whatever your role? This helps to demonstrate that you have a culture where falling down isn’t the end of the road and instead, is one where resilience builds.
If you’re noticing that your team’s energy for taking initiative has dipped, or that change is being met with hesitation it might not be motivation that’s missing. It might be that a feeling of safety in sharing and speaking up around failure is lacking.
That’s the kind of work I’m doing right now with leadership teams who want to move faster without burning people out.
If this sounds like something you’d like to delve into, hit reply or book a time to chat, I’d love to explore what resilience could look like in your world right now.
Failure isn’t necessarily something to celebrate but we do need to acknowledge it more often. When we do, it gives people permission to build resilience.