What's The One Thing You Need To Succeed?

What's The One Thing You Need To Succeed?

By

Eric M. Twiggs

The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.   Ralph Waldo Emerson

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

“Ron” had just graduated from college with the hopes of landing a job as the sporting goods manager with a major retail chain.  He was a star athlete in college, so he figured the sporting good department was a good starting point that would lead to his goal of becoming the general manager.

Ron had this track record of succeeding at whatever he attempted to do.  He was a great student, great athlete, and popular on campus.  Success seemed to follow him wherever he went.

He approached the job interview with confidence, feeling good about his chances of getting the position.  His confidence grew after his Monday morning interview with the hiring manager. He was dressed for success, and felt that he had great answers to her questions.  As the interview concluded, Ron was told that he would be contacted at the end of the week, with the final decision.

That Friday Ron received the call from the manager informing him that they had decided to pass on him and hire another candidate. He was so disappointed, that he went home crying to his mother.   For the first time in his life, Ron experienced a major failure.  Before you hit the delete button, keep reading because this sad tale does have a happy ending.

His failure to get the sporting goods manager job led him to pursue a radio broadcasting career.  The exposure he received from being on the radio led him to pursue acting.  His popularity as an actor opened the door for him to enter politics. 

The “Ron” in the story is Ronald Reagan, and historians believe that if he had succeeded in getting the sporting goods manager job, he may have never become President of the United States.  In other words, failure was the key to his success. 

Did the employment ad you just ran fail to generate any responses?  Did the “A” player you just hired fail to show up for his first day?  Did your recent marketing campaign fail to make the phones ring?

When I’ve experienced these types of setbacks, it felt like a punch to the gut.   That “punch” can be a signal of progress, if you maintain the right perspective.   Keep reading to learn why failure is the one thing you need to succeed. 

You Get Feedback

During my career, I’ve been trained to focus on success.  I’ve created vision boards, had written goals, and maintained a positive outlook.  My glass is always half full.  So, I was surprised to hear “Chubby” make the following statement at our last company meeting: “For our company to succeed in 2017, I need you to fail faster!”

 As I sat there, I wondered: “Why would Chubby encourage me to fail?”  And then it hit me.  You get more usable feedback from failure than success, so failing faster means learning faster.

During the time that Thomas Edison was struggling through the process of inventing the light-bulb, he was widely viewed as a failure.  He perceived his failures to be feedback.  Here is what he said: “I haven’t failed, I just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”   The key to getting usable feedback from your failure is to focus more on what you learned than what you lost.   

You may have lost money on your employment ad, but your learned how to write a better one next time.  You may have lost the “A” player, but you learned to do better job of staying in touch with candidates once they accept your offer. You may have lost money on your marketing campaign, but you learned to target the right demographic for the next promotion. 

 Feedback is so critical to your success that author and management expert Ken Blanchard refers to it as “the breakfast of champions.”  Failing faster gets you more feedback.

You Can Achieve Mastery

In his book, Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell introduced the world to “The 10,000-hour rule.”  Based on his research, he concluded that achieving mastery in any discipline required 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. 

This level of practice occurs when you perform a task, get feedback on your failures, and then perform the task again the correct way.    This explains why someone can have thirty years of experience as a shop owner and not achieve mastery. 

Without deliberate practice, thirty years of experience is the same as one year’s experience repeated thirty times.

It’s impossible to achieve mastery without embracing failure.   The critical step to embracing failure is to assume responsibility for everything that happens in your business.  For example, you can’t achieve marketing mastery, if your local economy is to blame for low car count.  You won’t master the sales process if the customers are to blame for low margins. 

Once you become responsible, you will be positioned to learn from your failures and move forward in the correct way.

Summary

Ronald Reagan’s story teaches us that failure is a necessary step to success.  Embracing failure is the key to getting feedback and achieving mastery.  Failure may not get you to the White House, but it may lead to you becoming a Top Shop!

Eric M. Twiggs

The Accountability Coach

www.autotraining.net

PS:  I have created a special tool to help you focus on what you can learn from your failures.  Email etwiggs@autotraining.net and I will send it.