the essential art of failing

The essential art of failingOctober 2014

Part 1

playing it safe

Our ideas of success is

defined by our family,

popular culture and our

environment.

MBA, entrepreneur,

surfer, six-figure salary,

New York penthouse

CPA, Big4 partner,

pianist, six-figure salary,

million-dollar home,

apartment in Paris

The boundaries of success are

often perceived as failures,

whether our own or those of our

environment.

bear

market

layoffs

failed CPA exam

starving artists80% of companies

fail during first year

market bubbles

flunked econ 101

glass ceiling

student loans

And there are fatal

mistakes we worry

about…

Ebola?

In Texas?

Given all this, most of

us stick to the tried and

true.

Big4,

one-bedroom condo,

vacation in Cancun,

upright piano rental

Oil & gas,

roommate,

weekends in

Galveston,

Young Professional

network

Part 2

outside the box

Entrepreneurship, innovation, growth and success require a healthy dose of failure.

The trick is to survive the process (no fatal mistake).

And what if we grew with each failure?

(We are used to learning from our mistakes).

Better, what if we ventured

further and welcomed our

failures?

Non-fatal failures are simplyinformation.

And what if we took the time to investigate each failure,

with detachment and curiosity?

Innovation rises from the unexpected.

(But we need to let ourselves imagine new outcomes.)

What would it take to leverage

failure to our advantage?

Determination, resilience,energy, method.

Part 3

methods

Failure as feedback

3,000 1,000 500

sale

s

Q1 Q2 Q3

What happened?

What information do we have?

Who is talking?

Failure as clarity

What works?

What doesn’t?

What works better?

Who owns the failure?

What’s our responsibility?

What to keep, what to toss?

Systemic or temporary?

Failure as timing

nownever

soon

Is our product ready? Are we ready? Are our clients ready? Is the environment ready?

Failure as clarity

What’s going on?

Better:

What are we unwilling to see?

Failure as opportunity

What remains?

Part 4

resilience

Non-fatal failures always leave residual assets.

equipment

raw materialrelationships

skills & knowledge

The big question is:

Do we have the vision and stamina needed to leverage our failures?

And if we did,

What would happen next?

Non-fatal failures are essential to

innovation, learning and continuous

improvement.

Build systems to extract information

from failures.

Practice leveraging setbacks into

new ventures.

Most importantly: have fun. It’s the skills you gain and the relationships you form that count most.

Weinstein Spira is a CPA and business advisory firm that

proactively assists businesses and individuals with

complex tax, audit, business management, wealth

transfer, estate tax and planning needs.

With more than 50 years of experience, we are actively

involved in the Houston community with a significant

network of relationships and resources to serve our

clients.

To learn more about services and career opportunities

visit our website at www.weinsteinspira.com

relationships count.

Written and illustrated by Marie-Pierre Stien, Director of Talent Acquisition.

mms@weinsteinspira.com