University of Minnesota - UMN Executive Leadership Insights
Decoding Failure, Debunking Feedback, & Harnessing Learning for Success
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Decoding Failure, Debunking Feedback, & Harnessing Learning for Success

Amy Edmondson, Adam Grant and Des Dearlove
Thinkers50, 2023
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Amy Edmondson and Adam Grant, two heavyweights of organizational psychology, discuss the intersection of their ideas — intelligent failure and hidden potential, respectively. In conversation with management theorist Des Dearlove, Edmondson and Grant jovially exchange views, questions, and explanations. The result is a warm meeting of minds, as the academics expound on their latest research. So grab a coffee and eavesdrop on their informal chat about failure, feedback, learning, and success.

Summary

To excel in any field, be prepared to learn from failure. 

Many people believe successful individuals are marked for greatness from an early age — like Mozart, a child prodigy who became a world-renowned composer. However, if you look at successful adults, most didn’t shine as children. Even when someone is born with certain talents, the main factors that power their success are their zeal for — and innate motivation to pursue — a particular activity or area of interest. Fulfilling your potential is, thus, less about your starting point than the distance you’re willing to travel to grow your capabilities.

People who grow and succeed long-term possess specific “character skills” that encourage perseverance and self-directed learning. You must be willing to take risks, develop the capacity to absorb valuable information, and make room for failure. Polyglot Benny Lewis learns languages quickly because he sets himself a goal of making upwards of 200 mistakes each day as he practices his skills while immersed in the homeland of a new language. Behavioral psychologist Adam Grant adopts a similar approach...

About the Speakers

Amy Edmondson, the author of The Right Kind of Wrong and The Fearless Organization, is a professor of leadership and management at Harvard Business School. Adam Grant, the author of Originals, Think Again, and Hidden Potential, is a professor of organizational psychology at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Organizational theorist Des Dearlove is a co-founder of Thinkers50, an organization that identifies and ranks management ideas. 

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