The Power of Failure

May 1, 2002
Manz is a speaker, consultant, and author of 12 leadership books. In this take he reexamines our culture's obsession with success and fear of failure. Wise leaders already know that the best recruits come from the ranks of those who have had significant failure in their careers, yet have bounced back. This experience gives them the guts to take chances when faced with the obstacles that inevitably occur in a challenging environment. The book is filled with stories in which breakthroughs and innovations come only after a string of disappointing failures. For instance, versions 1.0 and 2.0 were near disasters, but after version 3.1, Windows became the industry standard. At 3M, post-it notes resulted from a failed attempt at creating a new kind of glue. The project would have been scrapped except one employee started using it to make convenient bookmarks. The lesson here is that it's OK to fail, as long as we recognize our failures and learn from them rather than be stuck repeating them.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2002, American Library Association.)