We all get things wrong from time to time, and our response to being corrected is the key to future success. Daniel Kahneman was always happy to be “less wrong than he was before“, and David C. Baker knows that every time he learns something important “it’s because I’ve been wrong“. That’s not to say you should be wrong on purpose, of course, but to take the lesson in the right direction.
Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart, was famous for his ability to learn he was wrong and make corrections along the way. In the book “Made in America“, they share a few things about Sam:
Two things about Sam Walton distinguish him from almost everyone else I know. First, he gets up every day bound and determined to improve something. Second, he is less afraid of being wrong than anyone I’ve ever known. And once he sees he’s wrong, he just shakes it off and heads in another direction.
The second part of that is fascinating to me:
- “He is less afraid of being wrong than anyone I’ve ever known.”
- “He just shakes it off and heads in another direction.”
Those two have to go together. If you aren’t able to just shake it off, then your ability to learn from your mistakes will be greatly hindered. If you make a mistake a bit of a post-mortem to understand where you went wrong can be important, but dwelling on the mistake is no good for anyone. Shake it off.
