Executives who, through their words and actions, help people overcome their fear of failure and, in the process, create a culture of intelligent risk taking that leads to sustained innovation
These leaders don’t just accept failure; they encourage it
Questions to ask when a project fails
Was the project designed conscientiously, or was it carelessly organized?
Could the failure have been prevented with more thorough research or consultation?
Was the project a collaborative process, or did those involved resist useful input from colleagues or fail to inform interested parties of their progress?
Did the project remain true to its goals, or did it appear to be driven solely by personal interests?
Were projections o risks, costs, and timing honest or deceptive?
Were the same mistakes made repeatedly?
benefits of distinguishing excusable and inexcusable failure
Gives managers a tool to build a nonpunitive environment for mistake making while allowing them to encourage thoughtfully pursued projects that, should they fail, will yield productive mistakes
Allows managers to nonjudgmentally promote the sort of productive mistake making that is the basis for learning
Ways to be a failure tolerant leader
Get engaged: Taking tangible interest in employees projects
Don’t praise, analyze - Shows real interest, which prevents complacency
Earn empathy - Foster an environment of allowing trial and error, not discouraging original thinking
Collaborate to innovate - People are no longer competing against each other, which increases the innovation factor because people can do more when they work together
Give the green light - Failure-tolerant leaders emphasize that a good idea is a good idea, whether it comes from Peter Drucker, Reader’s Digest, or an obnoxious coworker
credibility / factors that compromise it
Honest - leaders are considered honest by their constituents when the leaders do what they say they are going to do
Forward-looking - true leaders must know where they are going
Competent - having a winning track record is the surest way to be considered competent
Inspiring - it is essential that leaders inspire our confidence in the validity of the goal
The sense that what has happened was actually inevitable
Pitfall of Creeping determinism
When we attempt to correct what happened, we end up creating new problems for the future (underdiagnosis vs. overdiagnosis example)
Power law
20% of the people account for 80% of the output (e.g., Smog in Denver, Million-dollar Murray)
Connecting the dots
The feeling that we should have seen something coming because in retrospect, it seems obvious that all the signs pointed to this inevitable result. (9/11, etc.)
Control model (including parts and relationships among them)
Parts
You
The system
Performance measures
Control - a device to regulate a mechanism (system)
Feedback - do not listen to the noise of the mechanism (Manager must choose what to listen to)
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