Many of you may have watched the Olympics this past week, and if you’re like me you happened to see the “fail heard round the world” as I’m calling it… or the malfunction of the snowflake turned to olympic rings stunt last weekend.

Don’t get me wrong, I was a bit disappointed that the ring didn’t open up, it sucks seeing the production have a glitch like that right at the top of the show. Here’s the thing, It was the ONLY mistake of the night to my knowledge. The rest of the show was beautiful!

But that’s not where the story ends… There was a social media buzz about a key official in the Russian production company killing himself after the malfunction. Luckily this was a hoax, but none the less, shows the publicity of the “failure” in a way that’s not normal.

As leaders, one of our roles is to provide a culture where failing is okay.
Where it’s safe to screw up.

As I look back on my life, I have learned more from my failures than I have from my successes. There’s no question about it. Failures are remembered… there’s a scar from it and in turn it increases the desire to get back on the horse and succeed. I’m guessing you would agree that you often learn a lot from failures.

Too often leaders expect and demand excellence to the point where failure isn’t tolerated. Thus, creating a culture where the team isn’t free to fail. In turn removing the freedom of success.

When you remove the freedom to fail, you remove the opportunity of risk, which in turn removes the chance of a big win.

Find ways to allow your team to fail within a safe and free environment. That’s when you will begin fostering success and allowing a freedom to win!

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