The POWER of FAILURE

Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.

Contents

Preface..........................................................................................ixIntroduction: Succeeding with the Power of Failure...............................................1Part One Redefining Failure and Success..........................................................111. To Succeed More, Fail More....................................................................132. Be a Successful Learner by Learning from Failures.............................................173. Recognize Failure as the Lifeblood of Success.................................................214. Learn the Challenging Secret to Successful Failure ... Patience...............................255. Overcome the Success Catch-22.................................................................296. In the Face of Failure, Search for Opportunities, Not Obstacles...............................337. To Be a Real Success, You Must Fail...........................................................37Part Two Winning Through Losing..................................................................418. Sometimes When You Win, You Lose..............................................................439. Sometimes When You Lose, You Win..............................................................4710. Succeed at Win/Win, Not Win/Lose.............................................................5111. Succeed at Being a "Tryer" Even When You're a "Failure"......................................5512. Help Others Win, Even at Your Own Expense, to Help Yourself..................................5913. Lose a Disagreement to Build a Relationship..................................................6314. When You Feel That You're "Losing It," Declare "Temporary Sanity"............................67Part Three Coping with Failure...................................................................7315. Accept When Failure Is Really Failure........................................................7516. Choose to Be Happy Over Being Right..........................................................7917. Use EQ to Cooperate with Failure ... To Succeed..............................................8318. Let Mental Storms Blow Through...............................................................8919. Use Failure to Master Yourself...............................................................9320. Discover Success at the Point of Maximum Pessimism...........................................9721. Both Beauty and Ugliness Are in the Eye of the Beholder......................................101Part Four Collaborating with Failure.............................................................10522. Fail Small to Succeed Big....................................................................10723. See the Magnificent in the Minimal...........................................................11124. Succeed at Living in the Present Moment......................................................11525. Continually Invest for Success ... Even in the Face of Failure...............................11926. Sometimes Choose to Get in Over Your Head to Get Ahead.......................................12327. When You Feel Lost and Demoralized by Your Life Path ... Blaze a New One.....................129Getting Started: The Power of Failure Motto......................................................133Notes............................................................................................137Index............................................................................................141The Author.......................................................................................147

Chapter One

Failure is the foundation of success, and the means by which it is achieved. —Lao Tzu

An aspiring young man once asked a very prominent CEO how he could become more successful. The CEO was Tom Watson of IBM, who reportedly responded that if the young man wanted to become more successful he should do the seemingly unthinkable—fail. In fact, Watson advised that he should double his failure rate. At first glance this is an odd prescription indeed. Upon closer inspection, however, it contains a great deal of wisdom.

A failure should not be viewed as the end of the story but instead as a stepping-stone to a larger success. If someone never fails, this is a telltale sign that he is not trying anything new or challenging. Mastering new skills and growing as individuals require that we enter unfamiliar arenas that can provide us with new knowledge and capabilities. These new ventures can be as varied as learning to play the piano, speak a foreign language, water-ski, or invest in the stock market.

The principle remains the same—you must experience failure in order to succeed. If you expect to learn without making a mistake, you are in for an unpleasant surprise. Imagine Mozart or Beethoven trying to compose music so cautiously that they never hit a wrong note. Do you think they would have been able to compose masterpieces if they totally avoided mistakes?

In fact, Beethoven was no stranger to failure. At one stage in his music career a music teacher said that he had no talent for music. The teacher even remarked that "as a composer he is hopeless."

The more you try to grow your knowledge and experience in new and challenging areas, the more mistakes you will have to make. Much of this potential for growth boils down to being willing to take risks. Author Carole Hyatt wrote that aggressive CEOs will tell their direct reports: "If you haven't failed at least three times today you haven't tried anything new." And she adds that avoiding failure leads to avoiding risks—"a type of behavior not well suited to most businesses in today's economy." So if you want to succeed more quickly, heed the surprisingly sage advice—double your failure rate.

Chapter Two

Bill Gates provided a practical perspective on the importance of learning from failure in his book Bill Gates @ the Speed of Thought, "Once you embrace unpleasant news not as negative but as evidence of a need for change, you aren't defeated by it. You're learning from it." He then went on to list many costly Microsoft product failures that provided the learning and opportunity for development of many of Microsoft's biggest successes, mentioning the following examples:

• Many apparently wasted years working on a failed database called Omega resulted in the development of the most popular desktop database, Microsoft Access.

• Millions of dollars and countless hours invested in a joint operating system project with IBM that was discontinued led to the operating system Windows NT.

• A failed multiplan spreadsheet that made little headway against Lotus 1-2-3 provided learning that helped in the development of Microsoft Excel, an advanced graphic spreadsheet that leads the competition.

Clearly Bill Gates had a view of successful learning from setbacks that helped him and his company to turn many potential failures into dynamic successes.

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