Leaning Into Your Failures

I had lunch with a hungry young college guy yesterday. He's a finance major, exploring what he wants to do with this degree. I met with him at the recommendation of his high school business teacher, who is a buddy of mine. It was fun spending time with him, and I wish him a ton of success and meaning in the season ahead.

He asked me one specific question that I thought was gold. In reference to trying to bolster his resume and find more internship opportunities, what things should he specifically be trying to highlight? That's when he gave me a little gold nugget. He and a buddy used to have a t-shirt company in high school.

By the phrase "used to," I gathered it ultimately failed.....he confirmed that notion. Perfect! Talk about that! Use that! I've interviewed hundreds of college business students over the years, and I frankly couldn't care less about grades, clubs, or awards. I wanted to know about real-life experience. It's fun and easy to talk about things we've succeeded in. However, it's an entirely different story when it comes to the times we've crashed and burned. I want to hear about those!

My advice to this young man was simple. Share what you did. Explain why you believed you failed. Communicate what you learned from it and took away from that experience. That's the gold. That's the real beauty of the journey. We often learn and grow far more from the failures than we do from the wins.

I'd rather hire or work with someone who has failed two dozen times than someone who has never put themselves in a position to fail in the first place. Failure builds character; it derives humility. Allow that character and humility to shine. Own it. Embrace it. USE IT!

Please don't ignore or hide your failures. Understand how they made you better and grew you into the person you are today. Then, use them to be better than ever. Advice for a college kid, advice for you, advice for me.

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