Pinoy Business Coach

Perspective
Written by PETER BREGMAN
Monday, 20 July 2009 01:36

Every time I ask a roomful of executives to list the five moments their careers leapt forward, a story of failure always makes the cut. For some this involved the loss of a job. For others it was the failure of a larger system, like an economic downturn, that required them to step up. Yet most of us spend tremendous effort trying to avoid situations that could lead to failure.

According to Stanford University professor Carol Dweck, we have a mind-set problem. She has done extensive research in order to understand why certain people give up in the face of adversity—or evade it altogether—while others strive to overcome it.

If you believe that your talents are inborn or fixed, then you will try to avoid failure at all costs because setbacks are proof of your limitations. People with fixed mind-sets like to solve the same problems over and over again. Children with fixed mind-sets would rather redo an easy jigsaw puzzle than try a harder one.

But if you believe your talent can grow with persistence and effort, then you seek out failure as an opportunity to improve. People with a growth mind-set feel smart when they’re learning, not when they’re flawless.

Michael Jordan has a growth mind-set. Most successful people do. In high school he was cut from the basketball team, yet he learned how to leverage failure in order to succeed: “I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career; I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I’ve been trusted to take the game-wining shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”

A growth mind-set is the secret to maximizing potential. Want to develop your staff’s skills? Give them tasks above their ability. Tell them you expect them to struggle, that it will take more time than their familiar responsibilities, and that you expect they’ll make some mistakes along the way. But you know they can do it.

Want to increase your own performance? Set high goals that you only have a 50 to 70 percent chance of attaining. Then, when you fail, figure out what you should do differently and try again. That’s practice. And according to recent studies, 10,000 hours of practice will make you an expert at anything—no matter where you start.

*A very interesting article which is related to building your own business, your failure threshold which is part of your emotional make-up is one of the key factors within the mind that you can develop.