How to Create a Culture in Which It’s Okay to Make Mistakes

Why it is unacceptable not to learn from them

The first two companies I helped to manage no longer exist. Things didn’t work out. Part of it was my fault.

At that time I haven’t got the support of real mind-blowing reading, from guys like Benjamin Hardy, Ph.D., or Jim Kwik.

Boy, how I needed them in those days.

But intimately I always thought I’ve learned a lot from the mistakes. And as hard as the consequences were, and the long hours of extra-time I had to do to pay my debts, I always had that feeling that this should be the best way to learn and thrive in the future.

However, in my country, Portugal, people didn’t think that way. Banks and credit institutions ran away from entrepreneurs that fail in their first attempt to have a successful business. Even society didn’t forgive someone who was bankrupt. They would always treat you in a different way.

Fortunately, minds opened up. Venture capital raised all over the world, and somehow people start to change a little bit their mentality. Although, in Europe, things always take a long time to change.

Confidence Is: I’ll Be Fine if They Don’t

“Everyone makes mistakes. The main difference is that successful people learn from them and unsuccessful people don’t.” — Ray Dalio in Principles

Creating an organization where it’s okay to make mistakes so that people can learn from them, it’s the best way to see rapid progress and fewer significant mistakes.

My parents were professors. They were civil servants. And entrepreneurship was not their motto. They wanted things as secure and stable as they could.

On the other hand, I wanted exactly the opposite.

I was always a radical son. And inside me, I had this feeling that things weren’t that way. I hated followers in the meaning of those people who believed in the mainstream beliefs.

Thanks to my parents, I was a book addict. I read all the books and encyclopedias I could put my hands on. However, I had no self-development books or CEOs' biographies at my house.

Just classic novels and all that stuff that injects into your veins that notion that the world is made up of loves and dislikes.

Yet, I wanted to know more about the achievements of people that changed the world. That was what I wanted. Until I found a book from Richard Feynman called ‘Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman’.

It was a mix of funny stuff and the brilliant mind of dr. Feynman. That book made me think there was an infinite world to explore. A world from other brilliant minds that somehow did incredible things to humankind.

I have not failed. I’ve just found ten thousand ways that do not work.- Thomas Edison

Mistakes will cause you pain. I felt them in my body and soul for a long time. I have two daughters who I say frequently you were very courageous to do that. I know it’s something you try to avoid, but today you had the courage to fight it. That’s my girl.

If you look back on yourself 5 years ago and aren’t shocked by how stupid you were, you haven’t learned much.

I share with my daughters all the time things I did wrong. Most of the times I even put some humor in those stories.

The best way for you to empower an organization, that be a family or a company, is to make a mockery of your failures. That’s the first sign you’re okay with failure and that these things make part of the growing process.

The Bigger the Failure, the Greater the Lesson

“Success is something you attract by the person you become.” — Jim Rohn

A story about an investment company, a huge hedge fund, that had a tremendous episode that could destroy one person’s carrier, but it happens it did empower all the organization.

Imagine his name was Richard, with a position of head of trading, that unfortunately forgot to put in a trade for a client. The money they sat there in cash and by the time the mistake was discovered it had cost the client (actually the hedge fund company) a lot of money.

It was terrible and the boss was furious about that irresponsibility and incompetence. Richard was waiting to be fired.

Although things seemed ugly, the boss felted that if he fired Richard, it would be counterproductive. He would have lost a good man and it would have encouraged others to hide their mistakes.

It’s okay to make mistakes, but it’s unacceptable to not learn from them.

After the dust settles, Richard worked hard to build an error log. Now it’s one of the most powerful tools they have in the company.

There are people with the capability, like Richard, to self-reflect and open their minds to learn from mistakes. But there are people who don’t have that same capacity.

Promoting self-reflective people, rather be a daughter, an employer, or a friend, seems to be a wise move.

Don’t Feel Bad About Your Mistakes, Love Them

If you can’t tolerate being wrong, you won’t grow.

You’ll make yourself and everyone around you miserable.

If you don’t find out what’s really true, rather finding your need to be right, you’re on the wrong track.

You have to have a willingness to repeatedly fail. If you don’t have a willingness to fail, you’re going to have to be very careful not to invent.- Jeff Bezos

Ray Dalio, in one of my favorite books ‘Principles’, emphasizes 5 important thoughts about mistakes:

Recognize that mistakes are a natural part of the evolutionary process;
Don’t worry about looking good- worry about achieving your goals;
Observe the patterns of mistakes to see if they are products of weaknesses;
Remember to reflect when you experience pain;
Know what types of mistakes are acceptable and what types are unacceptable, and don’t allow the people who work for you to make the unacceptable ones.

Recently I made a wonderful decision about my life. Not an easy one. But after 2 years of saving money, I was able to say goodbye to my 9 to 5 job and embrace the project I always dreamed of.

Become a full-time writer.

I couldn’t do it if I wouldn’t follow some of Ray Dalio’s principles. Especially the ones about mistakes.

A great lesson I learned with Ray was that to confront our fears, you have to confront our mistakes.

It leaves us with no ground, makes us fall and be dragged in a tsunami of emotions.

But regardless of everything, we come out of this whirlwind stronger. It is by looking at the light at the end of the tunnel that we grow and evolve. Even though in the middle of the tunnel there are strange faces judging and watching us.

The most important thing is to reach the end of the tunnel and see the immensity of light that makes us look at the world in the best possible way.

Final Thoughts

You may have noticed the number of top writers who naturally talk about the topic of failure and making mistakes.

And if this topic is so often talked about openly, by so many successful people, that’s the best proof that it’s something as natural as drinking a glass of water.

The main issue here is to ward off ghosts from the past. Our past carried a brutal weight on error. Whoever made mistakes was a loser. But fortunately, the world evolves, and we evolve.

There will always be a light at the end of the tunnel.

You just have to find it.

Thank you,