It's Okay to Fail, Conversely, It’s Okay to Succeed.

When International Day of Failure rolled out in 2015 we finally took a breath and looked at our success in failing. We have lived a life of seeing trophies go to the winner as they watched the second-place winner or what some have attached the line to as the first place loser, walk off the field with head in hands. And yet there are those who embrace that a failure is oftentimes an attempt others are afraid to take and know that ultimately a failure is the first step toward success. It’s a bit of a wheel of luck in uncharted territory where change is attempted in the absence of absolute knowledge and failure becomes simply a discovery process that is part of a path to accomplishment. Failure suggests the chemistry wasn’t right - yet - and those who have tried saw success, massive success. Consider the story of product WD-40 originally a water displacement product that has become a household name due to its universal use case across home and shop projects. It took 40 attempts to get the chemical makeup correct for it to achieve the goal established by its inventor, Norm Larsen. Sure it would have been easy on the 10th, or 20th to feel like it just wasn’t going to happen, but failure after failure lead to the massive success that has enjoyed since 1953.

But a friend of mine, Anthony Hirschman, suggested that we not even use the word “failure” because it’s simply to sharp and devastating, but instead to acknowledge setbacks and push forward allowing the setback to be the stepping stone that allows us to move toward success. Redirecting our thinking on failure allows us to budget in these setbacks or missed opportunities as investments in moving forward toward success. Noone came from having little to being successful without putting themselves in front of potential failure and risk every day. They call it the Hustle, the grind, and the execution and it doesn’t come for free. The path is arduous and is paved in reasons not to do business, so the failure is in not understanding that getting to the “no” faster is the best investment any salesperson can make because the salesperson understands that time is their greatest asset.

The great ones never stop doing it, they just gain efficiency in knowing when to advance or bail so their view on failure is different. Successful people only see failure when they have missed the early signs the investment was wrong. They understand every opportunity has but two outcomes, to advance or retreat. Even if a deal comes alive from the dead, the process resets into an evaluative process for both parties to determine quickly if there is a “there”, there! A deal retreating is not a failure, a deal that isn’t meant to be and is uncovered as such early on in the process is a success. When a selling person (sales, CEO, customer service) understands the value of time, the necessity to go into uncomfortable places and puts themselves in the path of risk to get with the planned outcome being success or failure, see the latter as nothing but clearing the boulders from the path you have set toward success.