Embracing Failure

In this episode, we delve into the power and potential of failure. What can we learn when we change our mindsets and see failure as an opportunity for growth and innovation?

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Rachel 0:07

Hey, there beautiful people. Welcome to NOVL Takes, the podcast where we lift a veil on business as usual. Join us for our novel takes on business, culture, and the art of getting things done. I'm partner and principal Rachel Gans-Boriskin

Sarah 0:21

and I'm founder and principal Sarah Patrick. It's time for a new NOVL Take. So I read an article the other day that quoted IBM's Thomas Watson Sr. He said "The fastest way to succeed is to double your failure rate." The article went on to say that in recent years, more and more executives have come to embrace the idea that failure is a prerequisite to innovation and that businesses can't develop a breakthrough product or process if it's not willing to encourage risk taking and learn from subsequent mistakes. This got me thinking about how failure works in the workplace and whether there's actually space for it and when there is how it's cultivated.

Rachel 1:00

I think this is such a great topic right now because you hear a lot of talk about the importance of failure, but I can't help but feel that a lot of the people who are espousing this doctrine publicly aren't actually as good at it I know personally I can talk a really good game but failure isn't easy for me. And on a basic level, I kind of find it frightening. What about you?

Sarah 1:29

I think my relationship with failure is complicated. I am not very comfortable with the idea of failing. I think having come up in private schools and being informed by being a Black woman who navigates predominantly white spaces, failure is something that can be really scary for me. At the same time, if I'm speaking honestly, there have been moments in my life where I have failed, and so getting comfortable with figuring out what to do with failure is something I have had to do.

Rachel 2:03

Yeah, I can look back on my life and say those moments of failure that were devastating, actually helped change the trajectory of my life, helped me grow in all of these ways. But you know, that's after a lot of time, maybe, you know, some of it with therapy, right. But a lot of times to understand that that failure is a positive is in retrospect. So the challenge and really the invitation

Sarah 2:33

mm-hmm.

Rachel 2:33

Of this current talk of the importance of failure is to be able to be in that moment and say, this is an opportunity to learn and to grow. And I think that's exciting. It's powerful. But it feels aspirational.

Sarah 2:53

Absolutely. And I think it's important first, you know, especially at the top of this conversation, that we define what we mean by failure, right? I think we're talking about those moments when you are going into something best of intentions, well researched. Well-planned well executed. And for any number of reasons, something doesn't work out as according to plan, right? That's a moment where it could be counted as a failure. Something didn't go as intended. And these are the moments where I'm thinking about an environment that I used to work in where when a project failed, there was such a fear of failure that the team missed an opportunity to learn from our operational mistakes and immediately went to blaming and finger pointing for who was responsible for the failure.

Rachel 3:34

I think that there's actually learning in a lot of places around this. In medical settings, in hospitals they have M&Ms (morbidity mortality meetings). where you're sitting there and you're talking about what went wrong.

Sarah 3:48

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 3:48

In a case, because it's important to learn from that. Here is, something that is devastating a patient has died. And then you have to go through and say what happened so that physicians can learn from it.

Sarah 4:03

Right.

Rachel 4:04

And that's important for the next patient. It's important that doctors do that. And I think there's a lesson in that for being able to come to the team and say, You know what, I, I made a mistake here. we can all come together and say, oh, well why did this happen? And then how do we fix it, and how do we prevent that from happening again?

Sarah 4:27

Right. it's important to to have those opportunities to break apart where the gap is, right? Because failure is so often perceived as a personal deficit. A gap in knowledge or performance or ability instead of a gap in kind of choice or circumstance, right? Like how did you get up to a moment and maybe make the wrong choice? And so I think that then leads to kind of shame or avoidance of acceptance of the failure altogether. It's important to pull the shame out of it, or minimize the shame, And leave room to kind of do the full debrief on, on maybe what went wrong and how we can make it better and how we can learn from it for the next time.

Rachel 5:06

you were talking about, this element of shame, and I certainly identify with that, that feeling of like, you know, you feel the heat. Like, oh my God, I did this, I did this. But I'm also struck by, you know, there are some people who have that kind of failure and the initial response is not shame and ownership, but blame

Sarah 5:26

Right.

Rachel 5:27

And I think that that's actually a really important opportunity too. Think of sort of design of products where, you have engineers, they've spent all this time designing something, coding it, and then they put it out to test it and it's not working and it kind of goes to, oh, well that's user error.

Sarah 5:48

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 5:49

Right? And we could look at that and say, well, the user failed, or say there's something that's not translating. If I have to keep explaining this process to users. Maybe this, this isn't intuitive.

Sarah 6:07

Right.

Rachel 6:07

To see that as a failure of, this design as opposed to a failure of the end user, leaves room to design something better. Like, you know, human-centered design.

Sarah 6:20

Right.

Rachel 6:20

So it's also how we approach those things and, and seeing it as an opportunity and even in that space of oh, I recognize that this is where it's breaking down, is this a space where I say I need a clearer user manual, or is this a space where I say,

Sarah 6:43

you need a clearer product,

Rachel 6:44

I need a clearer product.

Sarah 6:45

Right.

Rachel 6:45

that's a failure. It might not be like huge. I mean, it could go to market and be okay. But it's a failure in that it's a missed opportunity

Sarah 6:55

mm-hmm

Rachel 6:55

to design something great.

Sarah 6:57

I read this other really interesting article about failure tolerant leaders, and this is this was defined as kind of executives who, through their words and actions, help people overcome their fear failure, and in the process kind of create a culture of intelligent risk taking that leads to sustained innovation. I think this was, Harvard Business Review. And the kind of primary points that they were making about how failure tolerant leaders create this kind of culture of intelligent risk taking was four points. So it was the removal or reduction of bureaucratic barriers the admittance of mistakes by those leaders the avoidance of praise or criticism, and instead the use of like an analytical approach. And the encouragement of collaboration and ideas exchange. You have thoughts?

Rachel 7:44

I have thoughts. Um, I always have thoughts. Um,

Sarah 7:46

I wanna hear them.

Rachel 7:48

I would add curiosity. Okay. To this effective leader space because it's the curiosity of how did you come to this idea? You know, what happened? What would've happened if we tried it this way?

Sarah 8:05

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 8:06

What was your thinking? That curiosity modeled in that way also leaves space in rooms for other people to be curious.

Sarah 8:16

Right, right. I think, you know, that to me fell under the kind of analytical approach

Rachel 8:22

mm-hmm

Sarah 8:23

instead of that praise or criticism approach. But I'm hearing you that maybe that needs to be broken out. I think the way that I was reading a lot of that is it just felt really. Level setting. Each one of those tenants that was presented in the article felt like it removed some of the kind of traditional hierarchical ways of existing in an office relationship, particularly the kind of patriarchal ways of existing in relationship with management, with leadership That kind of amplify that fear of getting it wrong and getting it wrong for somebody else.

Rachel 8:57

You know, this conversation wouldn't be complete if we didn't, nod to the fact that different people different groups are allowed to make mistakes

Sarah 9:08

Yeah

Rachel 9:08

in ways that others aren't.

Sarah 9:10

Right, right. I mean, at the top of the conversation I mentioned my discomfort with failure in part informed by being Black and female. And I think there is Different kinds of pressures put on different groups, being black, being one of them, being a woman, being one of them that, you know, impacts whether or not I am responsible for getting it right. That idea that we also mentioned about whether or not failure is something that has to do with your personal capabilities versus, you know, something that's situation specific often is skewed depending on certain identity markers too. There can be assumptions made for certain identities more so than others that, a failure has more to do with your lack of knowledge or your lack of skillset or some sort of personal deficit more so than a situation- specific deficit. And I think that that is a burden that is then held and often internalized by certain groups. I know it's certainly something that I have internalized. And so I am very cognizant of not failing in a lot of different spaces, particularly in white spaces that I, that I traverse to, to be careful about failing because it, may appear that it is not a situation specific failure. That it is not a circumstantial failure. That it is a failure because of a deficit of mine, a failure of personality. .That I am the failure, that it is not a mistake that is circumstantial.

Rachel 10:49

I imagine there's also in it the added responsibility that you feel because you are there then as like an exemplar, right?

Sarah 11:02

Oh, yeah. Tokenism.

Rachel 11:04

Right? And, and so that it's not just I as an individual made a mistake because I am bad at this, but you know, all women, Black people,

Sarah 11:17

right.

Rachel 11:17

Asian people, whatever. You know

Sarah 11:18

right.

Rachel 11:19

Then it's generalized, so,

Sarah 11:21

right.

Rachel 11:21

in the same way that there's the pressure to be great at something because then you're going to show everyone how amazing and you know, you should like us and hire us and whatever. It's also because if we fail,

Sarah 11:39

Right, and you're carrying the pressure of everybody else on your shoulders as well. I think, you know, that goes also to this point of representation. I think there's more of that that you carry if you are a one, a oneness in your space. If there's only a handful of you, then there's more of that added pressure. If you work in a majority minority space, there's less of that I think. But I know I certainly internalized it and I know many others who have internalized that. So there is an internalized pressure to get things right and to be kind of risk averse in a certain kind of way. But I think that that risk aversion amplifies depending on the type of space you're in and who you feel like you need to represent at that time.

Rachel 12:28

Right. So it's, it is both internal and external.

Sarah 12:32

Right.

Rachel 12:33

Because certain demographics are allowed to fail up. and certain demographics, you know, you've gotta be 10 times better

Sarah 12:45

right

Rachel 12:45

to just get the same

Sarah 12:47

Absolutely.

Rachel 12:48

And so the consequences are far worse depending on your various identities. And so again, we go to a policy that has to be pretty evenly enforced because, you can say all you want that everyone is encouraged to take risks and fail but we notice in the way that that's applied and who gets honored.

Sarah 13:10

Absolutely.

Rachel 13:11

And, and so that, you may not trust that feeling.

Sarah 13:13

Right. I mean this kind of failure tolerance has to be baked into the policies as well.

Rachel 13:18

Mm-hmm. And those policies have to be

Sarah 13:21

Enacted upon, yes.

Rachel 13:22

Evenly applied.

Sarah 13:23

Evenly applied.

Rachel 13:24

Right, and probably also, you know, sensitive managers have to be particularly aware

Sarah 13:31

mm-hmm. Of the cultural differences

Rachel 13:33

you know, and the more visible you are in a room, the less safe it feels to take risks.

Sarah 13:42

Absolutely.

Rachel 13:43

And so that really has to be, you have to feel that your manager has your back. You have to feel like the culture is set up that way and it may take a little more to, to make everyone on your team feel safe doing that.

Sarah 14:00

Absolutely. Absolutely. it's also being able to create a company that is more embracing of risk taking. Because when you acknowledge in a shared space that failures happen and that they are not the end of the world, you make space available where people learn from their mistakes. And so, you know, not that you wanna encourage everybody to make mistakes all the time, but that when they happen, there's a process for how we deal with them.

Rachel 14:29

Right.

Sarah 14:29

And that risk taking can be healthy in certain environments.

Rachel 14:33

Mm-hmm. Well, and you can set up processes mm-hmm. Where you're saying, we're gonna get together and we're each gonna share regularly. Everyone goes around, this is a risk I took, or, something that went well this week and something that didn't turn out the way you thought it would, where you're making that part of the expectation.

Sarah 14:54

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 14:55

And that does create innovation because we seldom fail at things we've done the same way a million times. It's in this space where it's new. So if you're saying, I expect you to come in with things that didn't work quite right.

Sarah 15:13

Right.

Rachel 15:13

We're saying we accept fallibility, we encourage this risk taking and the learning. It's also sort of that depersonalization of it. I'm invested in my work. I care about it. But my identity is not so tied up in this one project, this one thing, that it's crushing if it doesn't work.

Sarah 15:37

I mean, what we're talking about is the space to try new things. Right? This is innovation. This is creating a healthy environment to generate ideas. Mm-hmm. This is a healthy environment to let those things not work. And then have a process for what to do when they don't, which is try again.

Rachel 15:54

Mm-hmm.

Sarah 15:55

So go through that cycle again when they don't work. And have that, like you said, decoupled from one's personal ability to succeed the next time.

Rachel 16:04

Right. I think it's also, about a mindset around resources. Tolerance for failure goes down in a scarcity mindset.

Sarah 16:15

Hmm.

Rachel 16:16

So if you're sitting there saying, oh wow, this, we only have so many resources and so much time, and you've you know, "wasted it" on this thing that didn't go anywhere, then that creates a space where there's a lot of pressure to get it right.

Sarah 16:33

Right.

Rachel 16:34

And get it right the first time.

Sarah 16:35

Yeah.

Rachel 16:36

ironically, it's in those moments of scarcity when it may make the most sense to try something different, to be innovative, to take those risks, because clearly what you've been doing, isn't working all that well.

Sarah 16:52

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 16:53

If you're in this scarcity moment, and sometimes, you know, in those mindsets we, we kind of double down because it, it's too frightening to take the risk. There's got to be a certain space to say we value this risk taking regardless of the outcome. I think we see it with the slashing of R&D budgets. I mean, R&D.

Sarah 17:21

That's your risk taking department right there.

Rachel 17:23

Right?

Sarah 17:23

Right.

Rachel 17:24

And when companies are worried about the bottom line, they're going, oh, I gotta cut that. And that's the very space where the next new thing is coming from.

Sarah 17:34

Right.

Rachel 17:35

So it, it means thinking about this at a longer timeframe, this risk taking may not pay off this quarter.

Sarah 17:42

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 17:42

Or next quarter. It might not even pay off this year, but our timeline is longer. We are hoping it pays off. And it may be that this risk doesn't, but the learning from this risk. Is the one that gives you the next big idea.

Sarah 18:00

Right? Right.

Rachel 18:02

And so again, you know, that scarcity mindset but also how you allot your budget, how you talk to shareholders. I mean, there's an entire culture around results that isn't about risk taking. So it's a whole organization

Sarah 18:20

Right.

Rachel 18:20

That has to agree to this.

Sarah 18:21

Right. That has to agree to be risk tolerant to a degree.

Rachel 18:25

Mm-hmm

Sarah 18:26

to, to agree to have some bandwidth for failure. But I also think that like there needs to be more conversation about the relationship between failure, possibility, and innovation. Right? Because to the quote at the top of the podcast, there is no space for innovation without first failure. You have to get something wrong first before you're gonna get it right. We learn more from our mistakes than we do from our successes. There's so much opportunity for failure and as we've already discussed, failure is scary and it's often disincentivized. And so, you know, it is A brave act, I think, to decide that you're gonna go for something when there is a considerable amount of risk of failure involved.

Rachel 19:14

I think we can also say like, there are lots of ways to practice this. A comfort with failure. Some of it is in work, in how we lead meetings, in how we are in meetings.

Sarah 19:27

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 19:27

How we talk about things. It's about when we talk to our friends and family.

Sarah 19:33

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 19:34

Owning those things. It's about, you know, if we're parents, how we raise our kids, how we talk to our kids about our failure, how we respond to their failures.

Sarah 19:47

Absolutely.

Rachel 19:47

Because, with any luck, that's the next generation of workers as well.

Sarah 19:53

Absolutely.

Rachel 19:53

And to say, yeah, I learned that I can play a sport because it's fun, not because I'm going to be the best on the team. And maybe it would be good if parents weren't quite so mad when their kids lost and yelled at at referees and coaches because losing is part of the lesson too. You learn. You go back and you watch the tapes and you go, oh, look what we did.

Sarah 20:24

Mm-hmm.

Rachel 20:25

And let's develop a play that compensates for that.

Sarah 20:28

Right

Rachel 20:29

We've gotta normalize this in so many parts of our culture.

Sarah 20:34

I think part of it is like each of us is gonna fail throughout our lives. I'm thinking, too, like the small failures. What happens when you overcook something a little bit? What happens when you miss an opportunity to model the behavior that you want to for your child? These are like the small moments where, like you said, we can practice

Rachel 20:55

right

Sarah 20:56

failing gracefully and learning from those mistakes. And then I think the next moment is to step out of our lanes, right? How do we then, put ourselves in a position where failure is possible? So not just when we come across failure- how do we learn from it

Rachel 21:15

mm-hmm.

Sarah 21:16

but how do we put ourselves in places where failure is possible or probable and figure out how to navigate those situations? As you were talking, I was thinking about a conversation you and I had at one point about teams and cross-training teams because that leaves room for someone to say like, I gotta be out today. Mm-hmm.

Rachel 21:37

And someone else can do it. And it seems to me that that's also the opportunity for risk taking because you are learning multiple parts and you may not be as good at it

Sarah 21:50

mm-hmm

Rachel 21:50

as someone else on your team. But you might actually

Sarah 21:55

right

Rachel 21:55

be pretty good or you might learn something from that that's useful in this other thing that you do. And encouraging that learning is a way of also encouraging experimentation and risk taking.

Sarah 22:09

Mm-hmm. Right.

Rachel 22:10

I think Cross-training is an opportunity. I go back to, medicine again, It's see one, do one, teach one, It's that process. teaching is part of it because then you have to explain what you did.

Sarah 22:25

Right.

Rachel 22:26

And understand that. And that process of saying this is how you do it, someone who's never done it before might say why? And that can be a really powerful question because I don't know.

Sarah 22:41

Yeah.

Rachel 22:42

Why don't you do it this way? Excellent. Excellent question. And then we have innovation in that.

Sarah 22:49

Absolutely.

Rachel 22:50

So sharing is valuable I think about my own life- failures as painful as they were, were growth moments.

Sarah 23:01

Absolutely.

Rachel 23:02

In my career. And, personally as well, and again, At the moment, I wasn't like, well, this is awesome and exciting, you know,

Sarah 23:15

Let's do it again.

Rachel 23:16

Yes. I, I definitely wanna experience this again, like next week. Can we go again? But it, it's not that it's enjoyable.

Sarah 23:26

No!.

Rachel 23:27

And we can take a little time. We can nurse our wounds. Some failures are bigger than others. They take a little longer.

Sarah 23:33

Right?

Rachel 23:34

But leaving room for that. and understanding that, life is, is not a straight path. Particularly less so now than it was 20, 30 years ago. Mm-hmm. You had a career was a straight shot. Now we're taking multiple paths, which means we all have to get a lot more comfortable with failure because when you're switching lanes, yeah.

Sarah 23:58

There might be some missteps.

Rachel 23:59

Yeah.

Sarah 23:59

Right.

Rachel 24:00

All right. We um, Don't wanna fail to keep time here. So if this conversation has piqued your interest and you wanna hear more about what we have to say, stay tuned for other episodes. If you're listening on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. Please rate and review us. Give us some love.

Sarah 24:20

And if you're curious about what we do over at NOVL or think we could help you or your organization, check us out or send us an inquiry over at thinknovl.com. That's T H I N K N O V L.com That's it for us. Shout out to everyone who helped us make this show. This is NOVL Takes