How Can You Learn From Mistakes at Work? Part Two

In Part One of this article, we looked at what do to when you’ve made a work blunder. This time, we’ll look at how to move on from it, learn from mistakes and grow from it.  

If you successfully resolve a negative situation that was sparked by an error but then give yourself a round of applause and continue with business as usual, you’re making a second misstep. If you don’t make note – literally write down what happened and how to avoid it – you risk making the same mistake again – and miss the opportunity to pass your own experiences and lessons learned to everyone else in your company. 

Next, resolve that it won’t reoccur. Along with your apology, assure the injured parties (your boss, co-workers, perhaps a client) that it – whatever ‘it’ was – won’t happen again. Voluntarily describe how the mistake happened and what changes you will implement to prevent its reoccurrence. Most of all, explain how you and your company are going to make things right. Handling an error in this way will reinforce the fact that you are, ultimately, a trustworthy company that can be relied upon. Plus, if you are clear and articulate as to the mistake and its full ramifications, then no one can throw it in your face later. 

Now the healing has begun. You gain confidence, courage and experience every time you make a new mistake and in time you will get better and better at the things you love to do. Remember Thomas Edison? He allegedly failed more than 10,000 times while working on the light bulb and in the end, he succeeded. When you know exactly what you want and when you are able to see this in your mind’s eye, nothing, not one mistake, can stop you from moving forward or stop you from achieving your dreams.

As you move forward, allow the error and the way you believe you are perceived because of it to fade. To replay your every action thinking about the mistake you made is more likely than not to cause another error. This is not learning from a mistake, it’s letting it define you again. It happened, you admitted it, took responsibility, you mitigated the fallout to it as much as possible. Now, move on. Chances are your manager has a newfound respect for the way you handled it and gives it no more thought. Neither should you. 

Finally, here’s a little checklist:

• Accepting responsibility makes learning possible
• Don’t equate making mistakes with being a mistake
• You can’t change mistakes, but you can choose how to respond to them
• Growth starts when you can see room for improvement
• Work to understand why it happened and what the factors were
• What information could have avoided the mistake?
• What small mistakes, in sequence, contributed to the bigger mistake?
• Are there alternatives you should have considered but did not?
• What kinds of changes are required to avoid making this mistake again? What kinds of change are difficult for you?
• How do you think your behaviour should/would change if you were in a similar situation again?
• Don’t overcompensate: the next situation won’t be the same as the last

Mistakes are a part of being human. Appreciate your mistakes for what they are: precious life lessons. So the most important lesson is to trust that while mistakes are inevitable, if you can learn from the current one, you’ll also be able to learn from future ones. No matter what happens tomorrow you’ll be able to get value from it, and apply it to the day after that. Progress isn’t a straight line and if you keep learning you will have more successes than failures. The mistakes you make along the way will help you get to where you want to go.