Failing is a means to an end, not your end goal.

A couple of days ago I stumbled across the blog of James Altucher. I’m a fan of his way of writing and the topics that he writes about. It gives me the impression of his thoughts, his way of thinking and what drives him forward. In his blog he writes about interviewing Tony Hawk, it’s an excellent read!

In this post he writes about how failing is an excellent way for learning. This idea has been receiving more attention lately and it has become a hot topic regarding entrepreneurship. People might get the idea that failing faster means becoming successful in the short run. Failing in itself is not the goal, it’s the means to reaching your goal. At least, it should be. The principles of the Lean Startup as coined by Eric Ries focus on validation and that is also where the notion of failing come from. The principle revolves around the idea that putting a product in the market as soon as possible will let you gain feedback as soon as possible which will lead to a faster improved version of your product. In other words, you want to shorten your feedback loop.

The idea that failing is a good thing is packed with assumptions. The goal is to shorten the feedback loop on whatever product you are building, it might be an app, a website, a blog. Let’s take the example of building an app. You want to valid that your first design looks promising and what should be adjusted. This means that you need to let someone have a look at it and share their opinion without biases. A common mistake would to assume that you have to fail in order to create a better design. Nothing could be less from the truth. Would it not be wiser to show a good design showing that you thought things through before diving into it? People, potential customers, would be more interested in seeing your actual product and would also be more interested in providing valuable feedback because they see how much effort you put into it.

That is also the point which I am trying to make. Not all feedback is given equal and whilst failing would assume that you will receive feedback does not automatically mean that you receive valuable feedback. You want to receive feedback with quality and you want feedback with quantity. Basically, you want to analyse your data. How many people like your product versus how many people do not like your product. This is your feedback with quantity. What people actually like and do not like is perhaps even more important.

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