Occasionally we fail even after careful planning. Nobody likes to fail I know I do not. However, failure is a part of our life. Have you ever failed? Most people fail before they experience success. The differentiating factor is what you do after the failure. You can sit there mourning and sorrowful, or you can rise up, wipe off the dust and keep moving.
It is all up to you. It is personal!
Here are tips that can help you be a success after failure;
Own your mistake
When you fail, take responsibility for your mistake. Before you point to someone else, look within and acknowledge how your actions or inaction led to the failure. If you are in a leadership position, it is important to take responsibility. Your subordinates will respect and trust you more. It is not an easy thing to do especially if the mistake is huge, but it shows your maturity and responsibility. Besides, you will learn more from it after owning it not the other way around.
Share it with someone
There is a high chance that after a failure, you will withdraw from yourself. Maybe you will bottle up your emotions and punish yourself daily. Talking to someone will help you to experience success by going beyond failure. Share your pain and frustrations with someone. Take caution however with whom you share your true feelings. You need to talk about it with someone who can motivate and encourage you to take the lesson and move on, for example, a mentor.
Learn from the failure
Thomas A. Edison quoted “I have not failed, I just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” This mental ability to see the benefit of a devastating experience will bring you success. It is not an easy thing to do, but it is essential to do it. To lighten it, expect to win some and lose some, that way you are ready for what may come. Not to mean that you do not give your best shot, no! There is a valuable lesson to learn. For example, early in my career, I rolled out a marketing campaign that failed miserably. It was such a huge mistake, with no results at all. I was like I need to go find another job and get out of this business. However, my mentor at the time gave me the above advice, and I sure implemented it. I learned that my lack of proper planning and research led to the failure. I did a much better job in my next campaign and from then on have been learning every day.
Separate yourself from the incidence
See the failure as a separate incident and not your identity. Most of the highly successful people failed at some point. Their ability to separate their identity and their failure made them reach their goal fast. The actions taken after the failure also define them as success or failure. Important to remember is that failure is something that occurs not something that you are.
Take action
Take the initiative to correct the failure. A common problem that tends to hold many people in a failure state is worrying. Worrying is like a rocking chair; you will move but make no progress. Do not let worrying and fear of making the same mistake enslave you. Face your fears to realize your potential.
In conclusion, to succeed after failure, you need to own the mistake, share it with someone, learn from it, separate yourself from it and take action. I believe the bigger the failure, the more significant the success you will have after applying these tips. How have you handled failure before?
This blog was first published on LinkedIn
