{"id":2732,"date":"2009-07-15T04:02:42","date_gmt":"2009-07-15T11:02:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/?p=2732"},"modified":"2019-08-07T14:31:11","modified_gmt":"2019-08-07T21:31:11","slug":"what-do-leaders-think-when-they-make-a-mistake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/?p=2732","title":{"rendered":"What Do Leaders Think When They Make a Mistake?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"iStock_000005924102XSmall\"A while back Lisa Winter wrote a terrific blog about what leaders say when they make a mistake<\/a> . . . “I’m sorry.” Her blog prompted me to explore a question.\u00a0 What do leaders think when they make a mistake?\u00a0 When I was a kid I was deathly afraid of making mistakes.\u00a0 My dad was a big, scary guy.\u00a0 Maybe he wasn’t truly the tyrant I perceived him to be, but as a small kid, he was terrifying!\u00a0 Even the possibility of making a mistake filled me with dread of the consequences meted out by my dear old dad.\u00a0 And my first reaction upon making a mistake was to be overwhelmed with shame, embarrassed that I’d displayed my imperfection for “the world” to see, and generally resulted in a sick feeling in my stomach as I agonized over the impact to . . . me!\u00a0 It was all about me, me, me.\u00a0 Well, kids can be like that.<\/p>\n

Then we grow up . . . supposedly.\u00a0 When we become leaders we have more to think about than our own humiliation when a mistake occurs.\u00a0 We can’t afford the luxury of wallowing in self-pity or running in fear, covering our tracks, or escaping punishment.\u00a0 Our focus must be on dealing with the impact to our team and our shared goals.\u00a0 There may be some social pressures to prostrate ourselves before the masses and indulge in a great deal of self-lashing, but that’s not going to help get the team and the goals back on track.<\/p>\n

A leader who cares more about the team and their goals than managing their image will do right by the team by following these guidelines:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 Acknowledge what happened, take responsibility (even if it wasn’t ALL your fault!), and apologize sincerely.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 Assess the impact, including gathering inputs from the team and other trusted advisers.<\/p>\n

3. Generate options, again with inputs from others as appropriate.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0 Decide.<\/p>\n

5.\u00a0 Take right action to make it right, or at least do what you can to mitigate the downside.<\/p>\n

Next time you make a mistake, notice how much time you spend worrying about the cost to YOU to have made that mistake.\u00a0 See if you can quickly move beyond your own selfish concerns to making it right.\u00a0 Regret doesn’t get the train back on the track.\u00a0 The self-talk swirling around in our heads in the midst of a mistake should be “Who’s hurt?\u00a0 What’s the impact?\u00a0 Can I fix it?\u00a0 What help do I need?\u00a0 What’s Next?”\u00a0 And, of course, we should always asking “What’s possible now?”<\/p>\n

Looking in the rear view mirror is a waste of time, except a glance now and then to remember from whence we came, and learn from the experience.\u00a0 Anything more endangers the journey forward.<\/p>\n

Oh, I guess I should mention that of course there will be those who delight in punishing you or throwing your mistakes up in your face time and again.\u00a0 That’s one of the prices paid for being a great leader.\u00a0 Trudge onward!\u00a0 The goal of leadership is not the approval of each and every one of the 6.7 billion people on this planet!<\/p>\n

The introspective leader has no regrets, only revelations upon which to build the future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A while back Lisa Winter wrote a terrific blog about what leaders say when they make a mistake . . […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[611,1370,613,612],"class_list":["post-2732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-leadership","tag-apologize","tag-leadership","tag-mistake","tag-regrets"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2732"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2732\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14250,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2732\/revisions\/14250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}