What to Do When You Fail

One of my strange super powers is that I'm really good at failing. By "good," not only do I fail often, but I fail well. It's one of the reasons I was hired for Appfire. No lie. That was the fifth or so sentence out of the CEO's mouth. "Broges, I need you to come in here and show people how to fail." Can do!

Failing well is oddly difficult. You can, uh, fail at it. Because a lot of people look back at the failure and forget to keep going. So, I put together a little list of things to consider.

What to Do When You Fail

1. Stop the bleeding - if you can stop the failure, or shut it down. Do that.
2. Apologize if whatever I did hurt anyone else - we forget to apologize. I don't know. Maybe we're still just noodling on the failure, or feeling guilt. Get any apologies out of the way.
3. Remind myself what I was trying to get done - sometimes, I fail because maybe I shouldn't have even been attempting whatever it was I did. Other times, I failed because I veered off and solved for the wrong part.
4. Ask myself if that's actually important - have you ever persisted but the goal was stupid? I once told myself I was going to get 50 pull-ups done one day at the gym. No reason. I'd only just become able to do two or three in a row. And I could drop off the bar, rest a little, jump up, and get a few more. So I said, "I'll do 50." Again, 3 or so at a time. Around #41, I tore my rotator cuff. This was before there was an easy procedure to fix this. :( Talk about "win stupid prizes." Three years out of the gym for that one.
5. If yes, review what failed - Review your failures. It's amazing how few people go back and "look at the tape" like athletes. That's why people can't improve. We forget to look at the misses.
6. Then try another angle - Einstein's definition of insanity is alive and well. Lots of times, we fail, and then try to just recreate the same attempt. Maybe we have to make some adjustments. Maybe we need a whole different approach. Not getting a new job fast enough? What is your method? Find a new one.
7. Or sometimes, ask for outside opinions (but not always) - It's another kind of failure if you're a perpetual consensus gatherer. It's amazing how many people put out more requests for feedback than SurveyMonkey. Do you know just how many problems you can solve without advice? But on the other hand, sometimes you've hit your head against the wall too many times, and it might just be that there's someone ready to step in and make it work with just a small change.
8. Throw more iterations at it - Sometimes, we just have to make more attempts. My long-running comment about this is that what makes me appear successful from the outside is that I take 100 shots and hit two. Other people take one, fail, and consider themselves a failure. Did I knock on the front door and nothing happened? Maybe there's an "employee entrance." Is there someone with a key code? Can I "call from inside the house?" So many approaches.
9. Record the attempts - this goes back to "review the tapes," but journal. Write down your big goal, and then write down your approaches. Talk about the ways you're going after it on paper with yourself. It's amazing how little we try to observe ourselves and then wonder why nothing happened. A lot of nothing happens when you don't measure yourself.
10. Repeat what finally works (Remember, it might stop working) - when you win, win some more. Do it a lot. Attempt things. Don't just stop. That's a whole other kind of failure. But also, be on the lookout for what works to eventually stop working. Very little is forever. Oh wait. Nothing is forever.

Oh shoot. I forgot to put down "feel really guilty and bad and pick on yourself." Dang. Sorry. No room on my list for that, I guess. Maybe you shouldn't keep that on YOUR list of what to do when you fail.

People waste SO much time and effort and energy on regret. Stop it. Regret is a tax you assign yourself.

Regret is a tax you assign yourself.

Now go fail already, loser.

Chris...