By Kai S. Swanson, Augustana College

When asked to present a session at this year’s NAPAHE conference on “Mistakes Made, Lessons Learned,” my first thought was, “Isn’t it super special that my professional organization knows it can count on me when looking for someone with experience in screwing things up?”

In reality, we all make mistakes. And with enough experience, we come to realize that a mistake only qualifies as a failure if we refuse to learn from it. That sounds so simple and self-evident, doesn’t it? And yet it’s actually quite hard to put into practice. Why is that?

Confronted with a mistake of our own making, our immediate response is fear. Sure, call it “pride” or “ego” if you must, but peel enough layers off that onion and you’ll find fear. We’re afraid of being seen as imperfect or less-than. And because work is tied to our fiscal security, we’re prone in our professional lives to a certain kind of fear with roots early in human evolution: a fear that we might not provide for ourselves and our families, and we will suffer dire consequences as a result.

In other words, it’s quite normal to want to cover up your mistakes. But doing so robs you of the opportunity to learn as much as you might from the experience.

I was once confronted with a difficult personnel decision, and I made the wrong call. In subsequent conversations with colleagues and mentors, I didn’t just identify the mistake; I was able to discern some of the flaws in my decision-making that frankly made the unfortunate outcome inevitable. Faced with a similar situation some years later, I was able to approach the matter differently and dispassionately work toward a better outcome.

Nowadays, I try to be quicker on the draw. If I screw up in a meeting at ten a.m., I try to be on the phone with the relevant parties by noon to fess up and seek a better path forward.

Still not convinced? Think of your colleagues. Whom do you admire more: the person who goofs up and tries to bluster on, or the one who admits the mistake and then works to avoid repeating it?

The difference between the two is fear. And because fear has been wired into our brains as the result of our species’ rather successful evolution, it can be strangely comforting. But the person who can place such fear in its proper context (e.g., it’s a simple mistake, not a saber-tooth tiger chasing me), tends to be the colleague we trust. It’s certainly the one I hope to be.

Kai Swanson has been a NAPAHE member since 2006 and now serves on the Association’s board.