How do you face the fear of failure?
An upset director asks his team “What went wrong? Why were no results achieved? “What is the reason for the failure of the project?” While everyone is ashamed and silent.
Unfortunately, this is a very common scenario in the work environment. This is because we were taught that failure is bad, it’s scary, and it’s even a source of shame. They taught us that the world belongs to winners, but what they didn’t tell us is that to win you first have to go through processes that are not necessarily successful.
He explains that, in the work environment, failure is usually associated with particular characteristics of people or teams, and is often accompanied by uninspiring adjectives.
Fear of failure in the team
When a team fails, the reasons behind the failure are rarely investigated and the error focuses on the team itself and judgments. For example, a team is labeled ‘lazy’, ‘uncooperative’ or ‘inefficient’. However, failure is much more complex than that and is related to a series of factors such as leadership, work environment, processes, type of goals, team profiles, the training they receive, etc.
But beyond the reasons behind failure, he points out that the important thing is to lose fear of it and that means understanding it as part of the learning process and an important part of the development of any company. It is interpreting failure as a great opportunity, and not as the great door to discouragement.
He Failure At Work Report 2023: Trends, Data and Insights on Failure in the Workplace (2022-2023) from Fuckup Nights, points out that fear of failure causes 21.2% of teams to stop proposing ideas for fear of them being rejected; 24% for projects for fear that they will not be successful; 36.3% postpone delivering results for fear that the project needs improvements and 11.7% prefer to involve someone else in a project because if something goes wrong, they are not the only ones responsible.
Consequences of fear of failure
1) Evasion of responsibilities
Teams that fear failure may avoid taking on difficult responsibilities or challenging projects, constantly limiting their professional growth and negatively impacting the company’s ability to achieve its goals.
2) Lack of collaboration
Fear can lead to a lack of collaboration and communication between team members since, feeling unsafe to share ideas or ask for help, innovation and effective problem solving are hindered.
3) Stagnation in the comfort zone
The fear of failure can lead people to stay in their comfort zone, avoiding seeking new opportunities or strategies that could benefit them and the company in the long term.
4) Low self-esteem and demotivation
It is also one of the main triggers that can undermine self-confidence and lead to low self-esteem, which can result in a lack of motivation and poor work performance due to feeling unable to perform tasks.
5) Perfectionism
The culture of perfectionism in the company is another way that manifests itself and leads employees to spend too much time on small details for fear of error, expecting everything to be perfect. This can increase pressure and stress, which in turn negatively affects your health and performance.
So how to overcome the fear of failure?
It is evident that addressing the fear of failure in the workplace is vitally important and that is why team leaders must create a safe and supportive environment where employees feel comfortable taking risks and learning from their mistakes, it is also important to define whether or not they really are errors, because there are multiple interpretations of this concept.
Here are 5 tips to achieve it:
1) Recognize and validate
The fear of failure is a reality that affects many and therefore denying its existence only worsens the problem. Recognizing fear and understanding its benefits in small doses, but without letting it become the norm, is a first step to addressing the problem and seeking solutions.
2) Promote open communication
Establishing effective communication channels and encouraging employees to voice their concerns and seek help when necessary will build much greater trust among all team members.
3) Encourage learning and growth
Encouraging work teams to seek development and learning opportunities, and recognizing and rewarding effort and continuous improvement will be the door to greater professional growth.
4) Promote teamwork
Promoting collaboration and cooperation among team members fosters an environment of mutual support where responsibilities, and therefore risks, do not always fall on the individual.
5) Recognize and learn from failures
As in life, not everything is resounding success and when facing fears there will most likely be a setback or two, but it is important to take pauses, evaluate learning and make the message clear: ‘failing is learning, not losing’, so that the team knows that By making mistakes you gain as much as when you meet your goals.
6) Review what is a failure, or an error
Failure or error has different interpretations, and varies according to the perceptions of a person or company. While for some a job may be a failure, for others the same job is the professional goal of their life. Given this, it is important to review both the concept of failure and error and from what standards they are defined.