Does your team take initiative? Do they embrace uncertainty and risks? how much risk?
Risk and failure are part of life and business. We should take initiatives, embrace risks and uncertainty to experience life and business in full, and we should be ready to face failure.
Globalization and digital technology bring more opportunities and threats than ever before. Being conservative and risk-averse is considered outdated in today’s world. The new era requires bold warriors who take the initiative and risks and fight and bet for high returns. It may sound like gambling, but to remain competitive and grow fast, companies must take risks, explore new opportunities, experiment with new methods and expand into new markets.
Leaders with experience in managing crises, going through risky situations, sometimes winning, and sometimes failing to achieve what they fight for, growing stronger and wiser.
However, most organizations have a low tolerance for failure, and therefore, most employees and executives remain conservative in taking initiatives and risks, fearing failure.
To change this conservative mindset and boost the appetite for taking initiatives and risks, academics recommend that organizations not only show tolerance but even start celebrating failure.
This is how “celebrating failure” becomes a trendy catchword in business. It’s often used by executives in many interviews and town hall meetings. It sounds sexy whether people practice what they preach or not. But here, we run a high risk of misunderstandings: creating the illusion that failure is fine and becomes a requirement to succeed.
“How much failure is good to celebrate”? Losing $10 billion? Getting bankrupt? What consequences we can celebrate? Firing people because of failure? Killing people because of construction failure? Certainly, not.
To succeed, you need to build credibility. You can’t build it with failure. You are paid and expected to show positive results. Not negative results. Failing means you damage your company and probably your career. If the failure is big, and you are responsible for this, you are probably ousted.
By “celebrating failure,” we mean taking small, calculated risks that may cause small insignificant failures while experimenting and exploring new opportunities. The real value is to “fail small and fast” when experimenting with new business. Failure shouldn’t have devastating consequences for business and people, or otherwise, we better mourn than celebrate them.
Failure could be OK if it’s a small part of our victories and wins.
People or organizations who have been successful and already celebrated many wins can also celebrate a few small failures. They will not lose their credibility. It will become the salt and pepper to make their career narrative more interesting to tell for interviews. If they have a lot of wins, they can risk a small failure by experimenting with a new business or in a new geography. They can simply tick the box, proving that they are well-rounded leaders taking the initiative and embracing failure and risk. They were bold. Not conservative, playing safe. Many times, they won big, and a few times, they failed small. That’s a great story we all like in business and life, perceiving those leaders as role models for others.
To sum up, don’t get obsessed with “celebrating failure”. In reality, it means accepting small insignificant failures without finger-pointing at the one who took the initiative and failed, despite all efforts to succeed. We celebrate that people (intrapreneurs) take the initiative and risks to create something. We “celebrate initiatives” and the effort to succeed. Successful leaders have the luxury of “celebrating” small failures occasionally.
Taking initiatives is important in business. ISOROPIN small failures with big wins lead to success in business and career.