3 Strategies for Learning from Failure

There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure. Colin Powell

There’s no easy road to success. Nobody can whisper to you the right answer as your friends did in school. Nor you can take a shortcut like your dad did when you took the road to your grandmother.

Life is full of hard lessons, falling and rising, persistence and optimism. We can compare achieving success in climbing a mountain: it’s hard while you’re going upwards, but it’s rewarding once you get there.

Here, in the Vacation Tracker, we don’t think there are bad events. We tend to see them as opportunities to learn new things and gain new knowledge. We’re determined to see everything that is happening to us as a reference for self-improvement. We want you to have a positive outlook on things too, and that’s why we decided to share with you 3 strategies for learning from failure which will help you to become your best self.

An important thing to remember: Even the biggest minds failed (at least once)

Do you know that, long before he made it with Sony, Akio Morita tried selling rice cookers that ended up burning rice?

But, why is so hard to learn from failure?

Failure can, indeed, be a great teacher; however, learning from failure is not an easy task. What usually happens when we fail is the overwhelming feeling of sadness, disappointment, and hurt. So how can we learn when we’re not able to move past those numbing feelings?
To truly learn from our failures, we need to know how to find those “teachable moments” they bring with us. That’s why we need a method that can successfully guide us through this process and improve our chances of future success.

But, before we jump into explaining 3 strategies for learning from failure remember: Don’t play the blame game

Failure is in us – we simply cannot avoid it. But one important thing we should all remember is that you don’t have to take the blame if you fail. You did nothing wrong, you tried and that’s what counts! Because our culture actively perceives failure as something inherently bad, many companies tried to “fix” this problem by rewarding learning from failure.

So what now, what are strategies for learning from failure?

First things first, when failing you need to go back and reevaluate the steps that led to your failure. What you need to do is to ask yourself a few questions like: how much time did you spend on planning the ways to achieve your goals? Were you in a rush to see the results as soon as possible, or did you take your time to execute them?
Sometimes a problem can happen following both ways. Simply, for some tasks, we need more time and careful execution, while for others fast reaction time is crucial.

You should also, ask yourself how much time you invested in planning possible outcomes and anticipating obstacles that could happen along the way. The truth is, many of us spend little or no time devoted to this kind of planning even though we know we might be at risk of failing.
That’s why you should always strive to cover all aspects of a task before you begin with the execution. You may fail along the way, but you should always have a second plan in case something goes wrong. And if you don’t prepare it, there’s a lesson for the future.

Among the best strategies for learning from a failure is to change your outlook

The point is simple: the way you look at mistakes you’ve made and how you react to them will determine whether you’re going to succeed or not.
Approach your failure with a positive outlook. Yes, it didn’t go as planned, and yes, you made a mistake. However, there are some valuable lessons you’ve learned along the way.

Instead of blaming yourself or drowning in sorrow make sure you know where exactly things went wrong and what you should try to avoid next time. Believe in yourself and make your failure a valuable part of your journey. Embrace it, don’t be ashamed of it.
Point is that your mindset plays a big role in future development. Adopting a “growth” mindset means you’re able to see mistakes and opportunities those mistakes create. With that kind of outlook on things, you won’t see yourself as “doomed to make mistakes” but rather as someone who falls, but rises with more energy than ever.

Once you know what you do wrong, make sure you do it right next time

It’s hard to make yourself “clean” from making the same mistakes over and over again. It’s like an addiction, even though you know you’ll fail, you’re still going ahead. To avoid those things from happening to you, make sure you review each step you take. Make sure those mistakes will not happen again by making a to-do list and monitoring your efficiency along the way. You can even try to ask somebody to hold you accountable and help you succeed.

However, we think the best strategy for learning from failure is by taking a vacation

Taking some time off from work can be beneficial both for your mind and body. If you let yourself move from the environments that lead you to fail, you’ll be able to think more clearly about the reasons why you failed in the first place.

We understand that sometimes is so hard to give yourself some time off from work. Especially if you work in a startup or you’re a CEO. However, we think that everybody deserves a break once in a while and that’s why we decided to make a vacation tracking software to help you with it.
There’s no great philosophy about it, all you need is to install Vacation Tracker on your Slack account and let it do its magic. Why don’t you try a 7-day trial period today?

Ana Mladenovic

A cat enthusiast and a cupcake maniac, Ana is a freelance Content Writer passionate about HR, productivity, and team management topics. When she’s not at her keyboard, you can find Ana in the kitchen, trying to make delicious cookies.