For example, meeting with senior executives in a large financial services firm in April
2020, I listened as they explained that the current business environment made failure temporarily âoff-limits.â Understandably concerned about an economic climate increasingly challenged by a global pandemic, these business leaders wanted everything to go as well as possible. Generally speaking, they were sincere in their desire to learn from failure. But enthusiasm about failing was acceptable when times were good, they told me; now that the future looked uncertain, pursuing unerring success was more imperative than ever. These smart, well-intentioned people needed to rethink failure. First, they needed to appreciate the context. The need for fast learning from failure is most critical in times of uncertainty and upheaval, in part because failures are more likely! Second, while encouraging people to minimize basic and complex failures may help them focus, welcoming intelligent failures remains essential to progress in any industry. Third, they needed to recognize that the most likely outcome of their prohibition on failure wasnât perfection but rather not hearing about the failures that do occur. When people donât speak up about small failuresâsay, an accounting errorâthese can spiral into larger failures, such as massive banking losses.