Duke MBA: Beware Of ‘Jerks & Weenies’

What can you tell prospective business leaders about taking risks and owning our own failures? 

I put a whole chapter in the book on embracing failure. Failure in and of itself is not a bad thing. But failing to learn from it is inexcusable. You take what you learn on one peak and carry it with you to the next peak so you know what you need to tweak or do differently on your next climb.  And the beauty of knowledge and experience is that it doesn’t weigh anything—it actually makes your load lighter.

You absolutely must give yourself the freedom to fail.  It’s so key. A lack of failure-tolerance stifles progress and innovation and prevents people from taking risks. I would even go as far as to say that if people aren’t experiencing at least one spectacular failure per year, they aren’t pushing themselves hard enough. As long as you bounce back from a failure and you’re better the next time around, failure can be an incredibly valuable learning experience.

How can a young person best exercise their leadership capability and how important is “practice” to leadership? 

A leadership mindset doesn’t automatically appear as soon as you get a promotion or new title, and this is one of the reasons I wrote On the Edge. I want people to realize that developing leadership skills has to be a conscious process and it takes time, so you want to be ready for whatever comes your way. You don’t want someone to hand you the reins and have your first thought be, “Oh crap — now what do I do?!?!”  You want to have the skills to lead confidently and efficiently.

And of course leadership is part art and part science. There are no hard and fast rules that will apply in every situation. The most important thing is to realize that in today’s business environment, everything moves at a breakneck pace, so whatever plan you came up with last year or last month or that morning will be outdated as soon as it is finished. You always have to lead according to the situation rather than according to the plan. Be nimble. Be flexible. Be ready to make your move when the time is right. Business school is the perfect training ground for young leaders. Take advantage of all it has to offer.

Betsy Massar is founder and CEO of Master Admissions, an MBA admissions consulting firm based in the Bay Area.

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