Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Learn; You Never Lose.

Inscribed in my son's school, this message is a brilliant motto as well as lesson of life. You can find these treasures only in schools. That is why they say 'Go |Back to School' to people who have long completed their formal education and are somewhere lost in the waves of life. Perhaps this is why they also say 'School of Thought' adding Old or New as a prefix to denote the obsolete and contemporary. School in real terms tells one about the world and the life, their meaning and philosophy.

Thomas Alva Edison developed close to 10000 unsuccessful prototypes of bulb before he developed the first commercially viable electric bulb. When asked about his so many failures, Edison was quoted as saying - “I have not failed 10,000 times. I have not failed once. I have succeeded in proving that those 10,000 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.”

Most people find it more difficult to handle failure than success. However the truth is that success seldom teaches you anything, although everyone including me will want success to happen. Success can spoil people if it goes over their head. Failure on the other hand always carries a lesson with it. Learning or not learning from that is our choice, often determined by our attitude. So while success is a milestone, failure in reality is the teacher. 

Winston Chruchill had once said - Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” 

J.K. Rowling the celebrated author of the famous series Harry Potter went through personal trials and tribulations and rejection from over 12 publishers before Harry Potter book saw the light of the day. The rest is history they say!

Despite failure being such a great teacher, it is seldom looked as one. Most people scorn those who fail; write them off and like to align with the rising sun. The one who fails often suffers from self-denigration and hopelessness. The failure turns into a loss and the 'failed' eventually turns into a loser. That pretty much pulls the curtains down.

Like most people most companies are also scared of failing. So much so that they try too hard not to fail at anything and if they do instead of learning from the same, try to take their eyes off it. Often success makes us blind to failures and we do not even want to acknowledge it.  

Toyota, a name that became synonymous to cars worldwide, became the victim of its own success. The case of unintended acceleration in some of its car model that killed close to 100 people in America, was attributed to serious technical flaws in the car. Toyota that prides itself for quality found it too difficult to admit that they had failed at something they boasted all these years. However as the investigation became more intense the results clearly showed that Toyota knew about those defects and had in fact misled US customers. In 2014 Toyota agreedto pay a staggering $1.2 billion to avoid prosecution for covering up severe safety problems with “unintended acceleration” and continuing to make cars with parts the FBI said Toyota “knew were deadly", according to court documents.

Toyota could have avoided breach of trust to its valued customers, loss of public image and brand equity and financial setbacks by plainly acknowledging failure and learning from it. Wonder why a company that institutionalized continuous improvements could not do so! Perhaps their overwhelming success in the past made them allergic to even the remotest idea that they had failed at something.

Aversion to learning from failure and too much attachment to past success can make people as well as companies risk averse and hence less creative.

On the other hand, companies that see failure as an opportunity to learn something new and build on the same foster a culture of risk taking, experimentation and creativity. Google rewards failure, Intuit hold failure parties and our very own Tata set up a 'best failed idea' award. The thought behind all these moves is very clear, these companies want to convert failures into opportunities of learning and by doing so they win more and succeed more.

Success is important, but it should not be seen nothing more than another milestone. Failure should not be seen as a loss, rather viewed as a lesson learnt. That way life for individuals as well as companies is an enjoyable journey that is full of excitement and adventure. People who view life as a destination often miss the point.

While success can engage, learning from failure can be engaging too. That way no one loses ever.