The Fallacy of "Failing Forward"

Gears in a work process

I recently heard myself saying to someone, “Well, if I don’t succeed at this, I’ll just ‘fail forward!’” As soon as those words left my mouth, I cringed and thought of all the times I’d heard this phrase used in organizations. It’s an excellent concept, don’t get me wrong. But of all the times I’ve heard leadership—“bosses”—say this, it was in reality just a throwaway statement intended to motivate and encourage harder and more creative work, without the culture and infrastructure to support the true meaning of this phrase. Failure as learning, which will ultimately lead to success, being the actual meaning of “failing forward.”

The catch in the concept is the term “fail.” There is no more emotionally charged word in the world from my point of view. The flip-side of this catch is the infrastructure piece I mentioned earlier. This failing/learning involves time and effort of one or more people, and resources of some kind which amount to budget, goals, and objectives, which are intertwined with a maintenance system that others—operations, accounting, etc.—manage, and for which they are accountable. This leads us back to the emotional side of the coin: when one group is encouraged to “fail forward” and the others to protect organizational stability and current success (aka, the status quo). Now what does THAT feel like? Oh yeah. How do we ever hope to get around this doo-loop? These are the stories I write.

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