Accept and LEARN

Following on from my previous post Äccept and live I have a tale to tell where my motto has become Accept and LEARN.

I work in a very highly scrutinised area and lead a very self driven team. I can rely on them to do their jobs as they are all well educated adults, however as their Team Leader tyhe ultimate responsibility for the success or otherwise of the team meeting or not meetings its goals and targets falls on me.

I had an experience in my job today where I felt – initially at least – that my superiors were calling into question the way I performed my duties, and rather harshly at that. In the beginning I was p****d off and wanted to vent as I saw this as an attack on mine and my team’s work ethic. As it turns out, I had failed to see that I had made an error however once my error – or more disturbingly for me a lack of attention to detail – was pointed out to me, it had me eating a bit of humble pie, although I reserved the right to uphold the integrity of my team’s reputation.

By recognising and then accepting that I had an error, I was quick to acknowledge this with my superiors and whilst I felt chastened I also learned that acceptance of failure is actually a strength and nothing to be ashamed of. Owning your mistakes – whenever and under whatever circumstances they occur – builds up your self belief if you are committed to learning from your mistakes. There is no shame in admitting that you stuffed because we are all human and nobody on this planet is or has ever been error free. Flip the bad thoughts you might have about yourself when you’ve made a boo boo. Think back to what the situation was, examine your performance in that situation, recognise the good AND the bad parts of your performance in that situation and move on. Don’t dwell on the bad – it will drag you down. Also though, don’t ignore the bad parts because your next attempt will be all the better for it.1

You’ve got this!