Personal Development

Dealing with Your Mistakes

What you can learn from your blunders?

How do you deal with your mistakes? Are you concerned about minor blunders, or should you only deal with larger ones? A simple process can help you overcome and use either to your advantage. Read on to learn how to best deal with the inevitable mistakes we all make.

Everyone makes mistakes

What do you do when you make a mistake? It depends, doesn’t it? Why be concerned if it is small and of little or no consequence? However, incrementally, seemingly insignificant mistakes can lead to real difficulties. For example, repeated small mistakes at work can be cause for termination.

But what about more significant mistakes you are better off not repeating? The kind that can bring remorse and may impact your life negatively. Those from which you can learn a lesson and perhaps enhance your wisdom.

“When you make a mistake, don’t look back at it long. Take the reason of the thing into your mind, and then look forward.

Mistakes are lessons of wisdom. The past cannot be changed. The future is yet in your power.” Hugh White (1876–1936)

While it is important not to dwell on past mistakes, it is also essential to learn from them and not do them again. The best way to achieve this is to find the lesson in them and put it to good use to ensure the past does not repeat itself.

Let’s look at a technique I have used to learn from and grow from many mistakes in my past.

Learning from our mistakes

Like most things, we learn from mistakes by asking the right questions and uncovering thoughtful answers. I created a checklist many years ago to help me work through mine, especially the more significant ones.

☑ What was the root cause?

☑ How did or can it impact my life or career?

☑ What can I do differently next time?

☑ What lesson(s) have I learned from this mistake?

☑ What wisdom can I take from this experience?

Example

A big mistake during my career was losing my temper when our equipment manager’s people botched a customer installation. I was angry because the customer was new and crucial to our growth plans. I had asked the equipment manager to be on-site to oversee things, which he failed to do. While he checked with his people on the project, he never visited the site to ensure the installation went well and everything worked as it should.

As VP of sales and marketing for North America, I carried much weight in the organization. Unfortunately, I berated the manager so badly two other executives complained to the president about how I handled the situation. It was not one of my finer moments. After the “conversation” with the manager, I felt terrible about losing my temper.

I knew I had not acted responsibly and maturely, and I quickly regretted my behavior. I returned to the manager’s office within an hour, and we had a much better conversation, during which I told him I was sorry. Unfortunately, the two execs called the president without realizing I had apologized. I discovered their call at a meeting the following morning.

The lesson I learned that day has stuck with me for over 30 years.

Let’s examine the mistake I made using the above checklist.

Who did it affect?

The situation impacted a customer, the manager, his on-site technicians, the company, and me.

What was the root cause?

There was a lack of on-site supervision by the manager, even though I had asked him to oversee it personally.

How did or can it impact my life or career?

The incident hurt our sales results, for which I was responsible. But, losing my temper affected how others saw me and could have had consequences for my career.

What can I do differently next time?

Wait until my emotions cool down instead of immediately confronting someone. I could then more calmly and maturely express my displeasure. I could ask how we, or they, could fix the issue. I could also ask what will be done differently in the future to ensure the problem does not happen again.

What lesson do I want to take from this mistake?

When someone in the company jeopardizes a customer relationship, I can wait until I calm down and am no longer triggered. I can then go to the person and inquire about what happened, whether I know or not. Once I have gathered the facts, I can ask what they will do to rectify the problem and how they will deal with similar issues should they reoccur.

I realize I must own my emotions and not allow them to spill onto others. By doing so, I take responsibility for myself, act more maturely, and treat the person as a person instead of objectifying them as an object on which to vent my frustrations.

What wisdom can I take from this experience?

Be mature and do not speak when emotions are high. Seek and create a solution rather than focus on the problem.

From this situation, I learned to live in the wisdom of the following words from one of our country’s founders and forefathers:

“When angry, count to ten before you speak. If very angry, count to one hundred.” Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)

The rest of the story

While I hesitate to tell you the second lesson I learned from this real-life experience, I feel I must include it because of its significance. The following morning, the president called a meeting with me and the two executives who had called him. I was unaware of this until the meeting.

In case you are wondering why the execs felt the need to tattle, I had pressed them on occasion, thinking they could handle it, but I guessed wrongly.

The president asked me what happened, so I expressed my concerns that we may lose an essential customer before they even used our products because of the installation failure. I admitted to losing my temper and realized my behavior was uncalled for. I then explained I had apologized to the equipment manager within an hour of the incident because I felt terrible about how hard I was on him.

After thinking momentarily, the president made a statement that floored the other executives and me. He said, “Bill, although what you did was wrong, you did get your point across. It is good you apologized, but I’ll bet he never makes that mistake again!” He was right, and we never had the problem again!

“All men make mistakes, but only wise men learn from their mistakes.” Winston Churchill (1874–1965)

Final thoughts

While the above is only one example, you can see how using a checklist to ask yourself questions helps you understand, learn, and do better in the future. All you need are the right questions and serious answers. Feel free to modify the above questions to fit your situation or use them as is.

Why not apply this or a similar technique to one of your past mistakes? Choose something important and turn it into a lesson and wisdom! Imagine the knowledge, experience, and insight you can gain.

I leave you with the sage advice of another of our country’s founders and forefathers:

“How do you become better tomorrow? By improving yourself, the world is made better.

Be not afraid of growing too slowly. Be afraid of standing still.

Forget your mistakes, but remember what they taught you.

So how do you become better tomorrow? By becoming better today.” Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790)

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Bill Abbate Leadership Writer and Editor in ILLUMINATION

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