The real success in failure

The purpose of this article is to present a new way of looking at failure. In today's high-pressure environment, managers typically focus on meeting various productivity or financial goals, keeping within normal limits, eliminating outliers, and generally avoiding being noticed for anything that may be perceived as negative--i.e., "do not fail." When failure does occur, and, inevitably, it will, managers become apoplectic, angered, or confused. This article suggests new approaches to embrace failures as opportunities for learning and improving at the individual and organizational level. It also presents common reasons for not planning for failure, how to overcome those reasons, types of failure, how to react to failure, how to identify strategies to build trust and eliminate fear, and how to implement the steps necessary to execute a "successful" failure.