[October 22, 2013] It is said that learning from your mistakes is the best teacher. I think the jury is still out on that judgment but failure certainly provides the most unforgettable opportunity to learn.
Senior executive leaders will learn lessons from those failures just like any leader. However, the lessons that senior leaders take away are more varied and complex.
“Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.” – Bill Gates
Most leaders understand logically that it is important to learn from failures. At the same time, they are naturally concerned that if they are open and accepting of failure (risk taking), they will be creating an environment of “anything goes” and where workplace standards are inconsequential.
Here are some lessons that all employees and leaders need to consider about failure. Note that senior leaders learn something a bit different. Their focus is at the mission or strategic level; and how failure affects employees.
|
All Employees and Leaders |
Senior Executive Leaders |
| 1. Accept the criticism | 1. Accept the responsibility |
| 2. Admit mistakes were made | 2. Admit that calculated risks were taken |
| 3. Determine what when wrong | 3. Determine why it went wrong |
| 4. Determine the immediate consequences | 4. Determine the long-range consequences |
| 5. Determine what tasks failed | 5. Determine what mission failed |
| 6. Figure out who was responsible | 6. Figure out what the system issues were |
| 7. Learn from tactical failures | 7. Learn from strategic failures |
| 8. Improve team collaboration skills | 8. Improve organizational skills |
| 9. Build more integrated teams | 9. Build an organizational team of teams |
The biggest mistake that senior leaders make is that they believe they should take control and employees will just tag along. That by having employees identify those things that caused failure and then repairing them, success will follow. This is certainly necessary and helpful, but it will not take your organization from good to great.
What senior leaders should be doing is giving control and creating leaders – building a team of teams. Those leaders can then understand the vision and intent of the senior leader and help take the organization where just the senior leader cannot.