An Exercise To Help You & Your Team In Re-framing Failure

Former NBA great Michael Jordan once said, "I've failed over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed." But what does that have to do with you? In every field, whether it be on the court or in the office, people experience failure every day. Failure is tricky, because if we allow it, failure can be paralyzing and can prevent us from reaching our true potential. The conundrum is that to be truly great at what you do, it is inevitable that you will fail. How you react to that failure will shape who and what you become. Fortunately, if we have the appropriate mental framework, failure can be an excellent opportunity to learn something new. The exercise below can be a great way to help your team in properly re-framing failure and will help you to learn from your mistakes.

The Reframing Failure Exercise

Below, there's an exercise on failure that we have done at MANY multiple times and which may be helpful to you or your team as well. Take your team through the steps below and experience the benefits of this powerful exercise:

1. Watch this video

First, watch this short video on the nature of failure and how we can re-frame it into a more positive learning experience: As Ashley just shared in the video, there are two ways to tell a story – "I’m a failure" or "what I learned/changed."

2. Create a more productive relationship with failure.

Challenge your team to take a moment and work together in the process of reframing failure. Hand out markers and pass out a ½ sheet of paper to prepare yourselves for Step 3.

3. "Write a news story" about this failure and what you learned.

Have your team write TWO sentences on the 1/2 sheet of paper in a size large enough that others can read it – secondly, make sure that the exercise is anonymous. Have your team take a minute and think about a recent failure – something that they tried and it didn’t work – then, have them pretend to write a news story about this failure and create a fake headline for it. It might be something like "Girl loses grant – workers and youth now displaced," or whatever your failure is. Now, in one sentence or less have your team summarize what they learned.

4. Post the half sheets of paper in a common place where everyone can see

Have individuals post their headlines in a common place where the full group can see them or collect them and place them on the board anonymously.

What Failure Can Teach Us

By juxtaposing our failures with a lesson to be learned, we can create a more productive relationship with failure that will assist us in the process of our own personal growth. This is an excellent exercise to try with a team of any size. For more insights on failure, success, and more, be sure to check out the full Connection 2015 playlist here. Click here to tweet about this article.