Recently I came across a book review written by Max Nisan of the book ‘The Wisdom of Failure’ by Laurence Weinzimmer and Jim McConoughey. You can find the full review here, and a link to the book here. Being a person who tends to make more mistakes than most, the title caught my attention and I read on.
The book was written because Weinzimmer realized that most of the great leaders he had interviewed told him their most important lessons in business came from their toughest challenges, not from imitating somebody else’s success. This premise is contrary to most other books on leadership that have the ‘Follow me and you too will succeed’ formulae.
In the course of distilling down all the lessons to just six, Weinzimmer also provides great examples to support his principles. As a teaser, here are five of those six lessons:
- Know when to quit;
- Say no to a quick buck;
- Don’t be defined by other businesses;
- Don’t try to be everything at once;
- Learn to delegate.
So perhaps in the coming weeks, why not pick one of these and see if your business is running the risk of not learning from other people’s failures. The Avondale Business School can advise your organisation on being effective in these areas – find out how by contacting Warrick Long at the Avondale Business School.
P: 02 4980 2168