We have to learn to love failure to grow. It’s a hard concept to accept as we have spent a lifetime with the education system telling us that being right was good – you got a “green tick” and being wrong was bad – you got a red cross.
And for us left brain thinking financial advisers it’s even harder to embrace failure as we are so logic and compliance focused.
But if we are only trying things we know we will succeed at then we aren’t taking risks. It’s this behaviour that leads us to tread water or to jump from thing to thing.
We need to reframe failure not as bad but as something awesome – because getting something wrong means we have learnt something and have the opportunity to grow.
Like when I ran my first Money Masterclass. I had only one person register. I had to ring and beg my friend Erin to come along.
I had put in all this work for just one person. I felt like I had failed.
It would have been easy to cancel the class, but I held the session and took it as a learning opportunity.
I approached it with curiosity. I wondered why only one person registered. I wondered if it was the time it was held or the marketing I used.
Fast forward a few years and the last live Money Masterclass I had 100 people register in an hour and I had a major panic attack because the room only held 70.
Imagine if I stopped because my first class was a failure, because I only had one person register.
What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail; if you knew you could only learn and grow?
- Maybe its approaching a joint venture partner
- Perhaps having courage to increase your advice fees (both for new and existing clients)
- Hiring a new team member
- Doing a Facebook or Instagram live broadcast
- Becoming self-licenced
- Changing licensee
- Introducing financial coaching as part of your advice business
- Starting a podcast
- Writing a book
- Saying no to clients that don’t light you up
It’s easy to wait until everything is perfect before we take action. But we learn by doing and failing.
Failure is our friend. It’s what leads to growth.
