Dealing with Your Own Mistakes
 
We want people to fail!  That’s right, because we all know that we are the product today of all of our accumulated failures.  We have learnt what works and does not work by trying something, failing and then adjusting the way we do things. 
 
American Basketball Coach John Wooden once said, "Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be." The obvious point he was trying to convey is that everyone makes mistakes and fails. It is what you do after the mistake or failure that makes all the difference.
 
This attitude to mistakes is particularly relevant here in Japan.  Errors are viewed very dimly in Japan.  In fact, the fear of making an error is so strong, that people are very cautious about anything new or unfamiliar, as the mistake incidence is likely to be higher.
 
If you grow up in Japan, you will have had this idea drummed into your head from an early age.  I encountered this when I was working with a visiting Japanese film crew, doing a shoot for a magazine image, as part of a product launch. 
 
We were down on the beach in Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast and the second camera assistant accidently dropped a completed film canister in the sand, as he was changing film rolls.  Without a moment’s hesitation the shortish director reached up and gave this 190cm, 100 kilo young guy a most tremendous whack across the head, followed by a severe tongue lashing for his error.
 
The dealing with mistakes culture in Japan is definitely in the tough love category. This makes innovation and engendering creativity difficult here because, the penalties for failure far outweigh the rewards for success.   As leaders we need to set the scene that mistakes happen because the creative process is messy and involves a lot of trial and error.  The team are watching like a hawk about how mistakes are treated and take their cues from there.
 
Lee Iacocca is famous for how he treated a multi million dollar failure, by one of his marketing executives at Chrysler.  It was no small change and the executive in question presumed he was being called to the boss’s office to be given his marching orders.  Upon entering the office he said, “I suppose you are going to fire me”.  Iacocca said. “Fire you! We just spent millions educating you”.
 
Is that how you see you own mistakes – part of your education or do you beat yourself up?  Here are 5 ways to shake off your mistakes and move forward to success.
 
Brush it off
No one is perfect. Once in a while everyone makes mistakes, it’s going to happen. Don’t spend time worrying about it, cooperate with the inevitable and focus on what you are doing.  This is how we learn, so see a mistake as a stage in your education. 
 
In high tech environments the mantra is “fail faster”, because they know how important it is to try new things when seeking breakthroughs.
 
Analysing the reason for the mistake, it is often because we are dealing with permanent overload and are always rushing.  We don’t take the time to check because were are too wrapped up in production mode.  Count mistakes as a cost of business and try to move ahead and reduce that cost factor.
 
Don’t fuss about trifles
Forget the small stuff. Perfecting something pointless or of low value makes no sense and adds little to the organisation’s efforts.  If you can mentally stop obsessing about the smaller mistakes, you’ll be more focused and catch the larger ones before they happen. 
 
Accuracy is a key thing, in some areas, so we need to flick the switch to know when we are entering a key area. When we get there we need to slow down and go for perfection for a few minutes in the day.  We don’t have to be like this the whole day and beat ourselves up if we aren’t.
 
Don’t worry about the past
Shake off your mistakes and move on. Don’t live in yesterday (or tomorrow for that matter).  Forget about what happened, no matter how silly or embarrassing. By letting go of the past it will help you focus on your current task