Fail Forward
I keep falling off this wagon. Its March 2022 already and I wonder shouldn’t my own motivations illuminate this path? the path to success? So many experiences to share given that it has been a whole year since. Maybe a ‘failure alert’ should be the title to this particular script that i’m working hard to pen? the needed motivation: this is where it begins…
Starting off the month that celebrates women by stating that I have been working hard at learning about failing-forward. Its been lessons of navigating the economic system, looking at the performance metrics and asking the big question how does it impact me?.
What do I mean?
In a project that I am currently involved in, which delicately focuses on scaling innovations in health. I remembered back in the day and fresh from campus a journey that had me build a mobile app that addressed the aspects of maternal health lets just say it ended there. yep.. though I will talk about this app features one day and even spice it up with assessing ways of validating systems for implementation. but,
Back to the health project, while enthusiastically sharing how the platform for engaging innovators operates seeing that I was presenting to a group of experts in the medical field, I shared about a great lady who was causing waves at the time, location-silicon valley and WHO I was fortunate enough to meet. The story of Theranos, a health tech company that claimed to revolutionize how blood testing was done. Though it never came to be-my curiosity nudges me to think of sparking conversations around the ‘What if’ it did work?
Assuming you have taken the time to read about Theranos and that your now familiar…here’s a cool pic of me and the then self-made acclaimed billionaire…
There are no born innovators. Just ordinary people who became great innovators because powerful motivations demanded it. It should be personal, perhaps have more compelling reasons. My take, the aspects of failing only showcase the possibilities of a solution. It tells you that you have figured out one way that does not work and as such have 99 other possibilities. We also have to be cognizant of the fact that failing can take a toll on you and in actual fact be a sign that some things may not necessarily work. It creates more ground of how innovation /creative idea we seek would be novel and more useful.
So where are you now and what’s going on around you? Allow yourself the space to try new things, make mistakes and learn.