Each weekday, in our Management Tip of the Day newsletter, HBR offers tips to help you better manage your team—and yourself. Here is a curated selection of our favorite Management Tips on learning from failure.
When Your Team Blames You
When your team blames you for a failure or a decision they don’t like, it’s natural to feel a range of uncomfortable emotions. How can you work through your response and rebuild trust?
Be brutally honest with yourself. Start by identifying and naming your feelings, then take an honest look at your contributions to the situation. Ask yourself, “What did I do—or not do—that contributed to these circumstances?” Regardless of whether you deserve blame, avoid defensiveness. Instead, give yourself grace.
Listen to and validate your team. Schedule a meeting to address their concerns, and do your best to be empathetic. You might say, “I heard your concerns and want to understand your perspective.” Give them your undivided attention, ask open-ended questions, mirror back what you hear, and adopt an open and nonjudgmental attitude. When it’s appropriate, own up to your mistakes.
Finally, work together to find solutions to ensure the problem doesn’t happen again. A collective approach will help rebuild trust between you and your team.
This tip is adapted from “What to Do When Your Team Blames You,” by Dina Denham Smith and Ron Carucci.
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Learn from Your Biggest Mistakes
Former Sony Entertainment CEO Michael Lynton and former Treasury Department chief of staff Joshua Steiner both experienced highly public mistakes that shaped their careers. Here’s what they learned.
Distinguish failures from mistakes. Failures can happen despite good execution. Mistakes often stem from poor judgment, emotional reactions, or a lack of awareness about your circumstances. Understanding the difference helps you focus your reflection.
Examine what came before. Don’t focus only on the mistake. Look at your mindset, assumptions, and emotions leading up to the decision. Ask yourself “Why?” repeatedly until you uncover the deeper beliefs or habits that influenced your behavior.
Get an outside perspective. It’s difficult to see your own blind spots. Talk through your mistakes with a trusted colleague or friend who can challenge your assumptions and help you uncover patterns you might miss on your own.
Don’t carry mistakes longer than necessary. Avoid suppressing or ignoring them. Process what happened, learn the lesson, and move forward. The longer you avoid reflection, the more power the mistake can hold over you.
This tip is adapted from the HBR Executive Live Event “Recovering From a High-Profile Mistake,” available exclusively to HBR Executive subscribers.
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Balancing Accountability and Compassion on Your Team
Accountability is critical for meeting deadlines, hitting targets, and growing revenues. It’s about fostering a mindset that encourages growth and trust, not assigning blame. Cultivate these three habits to enhance accountability—compassionately—on your team.
Think ahead. When assigning work, visualize the tasks and anticipate the challenges you expect to come up, then talk through them with your employee. By clearly communicating expectations and potential obstacles, you’ll increase their chance of success.
Own your commitments. Set the tone and build trust with your team by following through on the promises you make. Consistently meeting deadlines and fulfilling responsibilities models accountability, so if you set a deadline, stick to it. This consistency prevents disengagement and promotes a culture of reliability and mutual respect.
Focus on solutions. When mistakes occur, focus on learning and growth, not blame. Encourage a team-oriented approach to problem-solving. Discuss what actions can move the project forward, and involve everyone in the solution. This non-punitive mindset fosters psychological safety and continuous development—even through failure.
This tip is adapted from “3 Ways to Compassionately Hold Your Team Accountable,” by David Rock et al.
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Unlock Innovation Through Serendipity
While serendipity—finding something of value when you aren’t looking for it—might seem like pure luck, it’s actually a repeatable process that can drive breakthrough innovation. By helping your team learn to spot and leverage the unexpected, you can open doors to new opportunities. Here’s how.
Encourage openness to surprises. Opportunities often hide in anomalies. Build habits that help your team notice the unexpected. Ask them to regularly share surprising customer feedback or odd operational patterns. Over time, this makes your organization more attuned to hidden opportunities. People are more likely to see anomalies when they know they’re expected to report them.
Foster cross-disciplinary interactions. Innovation thrives when diverse perspectives collide. Create spaces and routines that encourage casual, cross-team interactions. In hybrid environments, this requires extra effort, so invite employees to attend other teams’ meetings or participate in cross-functional projects. Don’t overlook external networks—encourage participation in industry events and maintain strong alumni connections.
Make experimentation part of your culture. Breakthroughs often begin with small, failed experiments. Empower employees to test ideas in low-risk ways, and view any failures as learning opportunities. Back this with strong executive support—without it, experimentation won’t gain traction. Remember, even a failed test might reveal your next big idea.
This tip is adapted from “To Drive Innovation, Create the Conditions for Serendipity,” by Jerome Barthelemy and Nicolas Mottis.
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When to Apologize to a Customer
Recently published research suggests that without clear guardrails, well-intentioned responses to customer complaints can erode satisfaction instead of improving it. To protect customer relationships, you need clear rules for when to apologize.
Wait until the failure is real. Don’t default to preemptive apologies. If a problem hasn’t occurred yet, saying sorry can lower satisfaction—even if nothing goes wrong. Instead, monitor closely and only act once the issue actually impacts the customer.
Factor in legal and ethical risk. Some situations require transparency. If safety, compliance, or product integrity is involved, disclosure and an apology may be necessary. In other cases, an apology can imply fault and increase liability. Weigh these considerations carefully and seek legal guidance when necessary.
Let complaints guide your response. When a customer speaks up, they’ve noticed a problem. That’s your clearest signal to apologize. Make this automatic in your workflows so responses are fast, consistent, and effective.
Assess customer awareness. An apology can rebuild trust with a customer who’s noticed a failure. If they haven’t, avoid drawing attention to it. Use neutral updates to keep customers informed without framing the situation as a failure.
This tip is adapted from “When Apologizing to Customers Hurts More Than It Helps,” by Mason R. Jenkins et al.
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Get Your Team Back on Track When a Project Is Failing
A key part of your job as a leader is to keep your team motivated and on track when things start to go sideways. Here are some strategies to try if a project is failing and you need to boost your team’s morale.
Your team’s project might not be going well because the organization’s goals and vision aren’t clear, so get the team together to re-establish or re-define these goals. This can breathe a second life into the project and allow you to troubleshoot, locate pain points, and define a path forward as a team.
Then, to remove obstacles, reprioritize people’s work, reassign work altogether, and reallocate project resources (including budget) as necessary. These sorts of interventions will help reduce redundancy and clear bottlenecks that are getting in the way.
Next, recognize that different people are motivated by different things—for example, career-development opportunities or monetary incentives—and tailor your leadership approach accordingly. And schedule a weekly project meeting to create regular feedback loops about what’s working (and what’s not) so you can course-correct quickly.
Finally, celebrate small wins. Recognition boosts morale and promotes optimism—both of which lead to a sense of forward momentum on your team.
This tip is adapted from “Keep Your Team Motivated When a Project Goes Off the Rails,” by Rebecca Zucker.
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Owning Your Struggles Can Win Over Investors
When pitching investors for capital, your instinct may be to highlight only the upside. But research shows that—when done right—candidly sharing setbacks can increase funding speed, lower borrowing costs, and improve trust. Here’s how to use strategic vulnerability to your advantage.
Set expectations with realism. Investors don’t expect perfection. In fact, overly polished pitches may seem less credible. Acknowledging real struggles helps align your story with the challenges typical of entrepreneurial journeys, making your request more believable.
Signal honesty through self-disclosure. Talking about failures can be emotionally risky—which is why it works. When you admit past mistakes and explain how you’ve addressed them, you convey responsibility and trustworthiness. Investors are more likely to back someone who owns their missteps and learns from them.
Link challenges to a plan. The goal isn’t to vent, but to connect past problems to present solutions. Be specific about what went wrong, what you learned, and how you’re moving forward. That clarity builds confidence and connection.
This tip is adapted from “Research: Acknowledging Problems Can Strengthen Your Pitch to Investors,” by Christopher Bingham and Jayaram S. Uparna.
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Protect Your Company from Another Company’s Crisis
Even if your company has done nothing wrong, a peer organization’s failure (for example, a high-profile data breach or fraud investigation) can still tarnish your reputation. Stakeholders, including investors, customers, and employees, often make snap judgments, grouping firms by category, geography, or shared suppliers. To protect your organization, treat peer scandals not as distant events but as potential threats—and act fast.
Monitor and diagnose early. Don’t just follow headlines. Use early-warning systems—like social listening or investor sentiment analysis—to spot brewing crises. Then map your exposure, looking out for shared suppliers, overlapping markets, or common governance ties. The faster you understand the risk, the faster you can mitigate it.
Take bold, visible action. Silence invites suspicion. To stand apart, take tangible steps that show how your practices differ from the failing peer. Publish third-party audits, change vendors if necessary, or invite regulators to observe internal processes. Costly, visible actions prove you’re serious.
Engage stakeholders directly. Tailor your response to each audience. Reassure investors with governance changes, address customers’ fears with proof of safety, and support employees with clear communication. One-size-fits-all won’t work; targeted messaging builds trust.
Find the hidden opportunity. When a peer stumbles, use the moment to strengthen your position. Update your processes, raise standards, or highlight structural differences that set you apart. Done well, a peer’s crisis can actually clarify your value.
This tip is adapted from “When Another Company’s Crisis Hurts Your Reputation,” by Wei Shi.
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Learn from Negotiation Failure in 5 Steps
A failed negotiation stings, but it presents an opportunity to improve. The best negotiators don’t avoid failure but instead analyze and learn from it. Follow these five steps to turn a setback into a growth opportunity.
Acknowledge—and accept—the failure. It’s easy to blame others or ignore what went wrong, but denial prevents growth. Accept the outcome without excuses. Recognizing your role in the failure allows you to move forward with clarity.
Analyze what went wrong. Break down the negotiation step by step. Did you misjudge priorities, overlook key information, or let emotions dictate decisions? Identify the turning point and assess how different choices might have led to a better outcome.
Extract key lessons. Not every mistake applies to every situation. Distinguish between missteps that were circumstantial and those that reveal deeper patterns and weaknesses.
Address your weaknesses. Do you give in too easily, avoid conflict, or struggle to adapt? Take a good look at yourself as a negotiator and actively commit to unlearning the behaviors holding you back—and to building new skills that will contribute to future success.
Return to the table with confidence. Whether you reopen the same negotiation or move on to a new one, commit to approaching the situation differently this time—for example, perhaps you’ve realized that an emotional appeal that seeks to ease your counterpart’s fears and concerns will be more persuasive than using logic.
This tip is adapted from “How to Learn from a Failed Negotiation,” by Joshua N. Weiss.
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Succeeding a Failed Predecessor
Being promoted after a leader fails is a unique leadership challenge. You’re inheriting instability, not just a new title. If you’ve just stepped into such a role, here’s how to steady the ship and succeed where your predecessor didn’t.
Expect the unexpected. The underlying situation may be worse than you think. Broken systems, frayed trust, and hidden risks will emerge fast. Stay grounded and ready to absorb tough truths without losing your footing.
Make time for reflection. Don’t jump to fixing problems—start by diagnosing them. Ask what failed, what assumptions drove past choices, and which stakeholders need immediate attention. The deeper your understanding, the sharper your strategy.
Dig in before delegating. In a turnaround, surface-level oversight won’t work. Roll up your sleeves, get close to operations, and earn credibility through action. Only delegate once you’ve stabilized what matters.
Speak plainly—and often. People want honesty, not blame. Share what’s broken and where you’re headed. Use consistent language, repeat your core message, and show you’re steady in a crisis.
Ensure your team is having the right conversations. Eliminate silos and shift leadership conversations from updates to collective strategy. If performance is lagging, make necessary changes quickly.
Protect your capacity. You can’t fix everything at once. Prioritize, pace yourself, and make rest part of the plan—not an afterthought.
This tip is adapted from “Leading After Your Predecessor Fails,” by Jordan Stark and Darcy Eikenberg.
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Start a Change Effort by Acknowledging Past Efforts That Failed
When it comes to organizational change, most companies have some track record of failure. That’s why leaders who are beginning new change efforts should acknowledge those that fell short in the past.
Employees have seen their fair share of these failures, which means they’re likely to view your approach with skepticism, no matter how promising you think it is. To win them over, show that you understand the frustration they feel.
Talk about the time, effort, and emotional commitment they put toward past change efforts, and apologize for those efforts’ underwhelming results. (Yes, apologize — even if you weren’t at fault.) Explaining why previous initiatives failed, in detail, will strengthen your credibility.
You should also explain why the new approach has a good chance of succeeding, making the case with evidence and no-nonsense forthrightness. Being honest and open in your delivery will help to dispel employees’ cynicism, which will help you avoid the fate of your predecessors.
This tip is adapted from “Leading Change in a Company That’s Historically Bad At It,” by Ron Carucci
