4 Things to Know About Failure That Can Help You Succeed

If there’s one thing Americans love, it’s a good comeback. Comebacks inspire us to learn from failures and persevere until we succeed.

I am still inspired by the New England Patriots’ historic comeback in Super Bowl LI. To me, even more amazing than their 31-point comeback was their leaders’ determination to learn from their failures. If you looked at the sidelines when the Patriots were losing 28-3, head coach Bill Belichick and quarterback Tom Brady weren’t questioning each other’s leadership. They were working to correct their mistakes and lead their team forward.

The same is true in a successful business. Our nation’s largest automaker, GM, went from bankruptcy 10 years ago to being recognized as “one of the world’s best-run car companies” today. How? GM’s leadership team recognized their organization had nearly failed due to internal battles, so they re-organized GM around “collaboration instead of conflict.”

Success and failure are intricately linked. Studies have shown that how parents teach kids about failure can predict future success. Children who are taught that failure is something to be overcome, rather than accepted, do better academically. Other studies have found that focusing on past failures will impair future performance, but people who adopt positive mindsets have a better chance at success.

I’ve had my own share of challenging times, and I think it’s important for CEOs and other leaders to be up-front about the fact that the journey is never easy. When I was in my final year at the United States Military Academy at West Point, my father passed away. He had been my childhood hero and my source for sage advice about the military and life. This was one of the most difficult times in my life, but when I challenged myself to find new support networks and focus on my studies, I ended up graduating as a distinguished cadet and went on to become first in my class in flight school after graduation.

In the years since, I’ve learned a few things about failure that have changed my view – and might change yours:

1. Failure doesn’t close doors forever. Very few people have heard of the Traf-O-Data. That minicomputer was Bill Gates’ first product, but it never became a household name. That’s because it was a bust. But Gates took the lessons he learned from the experience to launch Microsoft.

In the publishing industry, failure is actually becoming profitable. According to a recent BBC article, “From memoir and self-care books to comic novels, writing about our flaws and imperfections has never been so popular.”

So allow me to share a few lessons from my failures. Early in my career, I was first rejected from what I thought was my “safe” school’s graduate program. I was devastated when I received that “Thanks, but no thanks” rejection letter. I knew the other schools where I applied had even more stringent acceptance rates. Feeling like a failure for several weeks, I eventually received acceptance letters to both the Harvard Business School and Yale’s School of Organization and Management. Upon graduation from HBS, I was able to go back to West Point to begin a new career as an Economics & Finance faculty member.

Not getting what we want, or what we set out to achieve, is disappointing. But it doesn’t mean we won’t succeed. Owning and learning from failure can often lead us to greater success.

2. Progress forward isn’t always linear. Success comes and goes, and so does failure. Life is about learning from setbacks, yet still moving forward. In the 1980s, the band Journey was at the top of the music charts. They had money, fame and a hit song, “Don’t Stop Believin’.” But they plummeted in popularity over the next several decades – until the popular TV show Glee covered the song in its 2009 pilot. Journey found a new singer and found itself back on the Billboard Hot 100, regaining fame with a new generation.

After working 10 years in executive leadership roles at Pentagon Federal Credit Union, with hopes of competing for the CEO position, I received the news that PenFed’s CEO at the time decided to delay his retirement for four more years. It was the right move for the credit union, since the economy was still recovering from the Great Recession and a CEO change could have been perceived negatively. But it was a major setback to my career growth plans. I would have to wait four more years to compete for that CEO position.

I could have left PenFed for another CEO position. But I decided to stay and continue to learn. In the end, it proved to be a blessing. I learned to be patient and be ready when the opportunity eventually presented itself. Those four additional years of learning were instrumental in shaping me to become a better CEO when I was selected.

3. It might be lonely at the top, but you’re not alone at the bottom. Learning I wasn’t alone in my times of failure helped me put life in context. It’s why, when I spoke to a group of students at the University of Michigan this summer, I decided to share stories about my own setbacks with them.

It wasn’t easy reliving experiences of failures and setbacks. But afterward, dozens of students approached me to tell me their own stories – of overcoming abusive relationships, losing their parents or being diagnosed with disabilities. They shared the importance of having others in their lives who helped them move forward. I felt by opening up to them, I had shown them that being vulnerable isn’t a failure.

4. There’s beauty in imperfection. The Japanese have a concept called wabi-sabi. It means not just accepting the imperfect, but seeing the beauty in it. For centuries, the Japanese have long demonstrated this practice through Kintsugi, the art of filling broken pottery cracks with gold.

Aiming for perfection can be a Sisyphean task, because you’ll never get there. In his book “Happy Ever After: Escaping the Myth of the Perfect Life,” Paul Dolan found that people who choose a different path from what society says will make them happy are often happier in the end. “By freeing ourselves from the idea of the ‘perfect life,’” he writes, “We might each find a life worth living.”

Just as losses often do, failures make us acutely aware of our blessings – and much less likely to take success for granted. Appreciating success when we find it is sometimes the difference between those who keep it and those who lose it.

James R. Schenck is President/CEO of PenFed CU and CEO of the PenFed Foundation. He can be reached at 571-328-1854.