Fail Faster

FAIL FASTER

 

I’m not the first to use the term “fail faster”. But I do love it. The CEO of Coca-Cola at the annual meeting informed shareholders that the company was now going on an innovation tear and that his organization’s reinvention plan was contained in a document entitled “The Manifesto for Growth”. He noted that spending on marketing and innovation would increase by US$400 million and then – here’s the big line – observed, “You will see some failures. As we take more risks, this is something we must accept as part of the regeneration process.” Which brings me to the imperative of the Failing Fast.

 

At a leadership presentation I gave a while ago to the sales team of a large pharmaceutical company, someone came up to me afterwards and said, “ Robin, I loved your speech. Especially the idea about failure being the price of greatness.” That reminded me that too many of us are so afraid of failure that we don’t even try (Seneca once said, “It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare. It is because we do not dare that things are difficult”) Many of us are frightened of looking silly or being embarrassed by failure and as a result, we don’t take the risk and seize an opportunity. We think failure is bad. It isn’t. It’s good. No, it’s great.

 

There can be no success without failure. It’s just part of the process. The company and people who have reached the heights of success are the ones that have failed the most often. You need to fail to win. And the faster you fail, the more quickly you’ll learn precisely what you need to do to win. So fail fast. Out-fail the competition. Out-fail the person you once were. I’ll leave you with a quote from Robert F Kennedy: “Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly”

 

“There can be no success without failure. It’s just part of the process…You need to fail to win”