How to Handle Your Entrepreneurial Failures

“You’re a failure!” Those are the words that we all try to avoid in everything we do but an entrepreneur that fears failure is probably in the wrong line of work. While they aren’t listing their failures on their resume, most entrepreneurs have tasted defeat at least once in their career and likely more often than that.

Billionaire Mark Cuban talks about his many failures in this article but there are many more. Albert Einstein, Julia Roberts, and Muhammad Ali are just a few. Becoming an entrepreneur is different from other jobs. When you take a job for another company, often it’s not your sole responsibility to make all of the pieces and parts of the company run but as an entrepreneur, you’re not only the main driving force in the company, you’re going down a road that very few have traveled. You have a new idea making the chances of failure even higher.

If you reach a point in your career where you have to admit failure, how should you handle it? Here are a few ideas:

Take Responsibility

There were likely more factors involved in your failure than just you but use this as a lesson in leadership. While there may be many reasons outside of yourself that caused the failure, in the end, it is your business, your idea, and your money and that makes the failure your fault. The sooner you can take responsibility for it, the sooner you can learn from it. As long as you blame the factors outside of yourself, you’re destined to repeat the same mistakes.

Pull Out the Goods

Nothing goes 100% bad. In every business, every deal, every sale, and every idea, there are elements of good within what seems like an endless stream of bad. Maybe you worked with somebody that gave you great service and value. Hold on to that person for next time.

Celebrate it!

Don’t try to sweep your failure under the rug. Celebrate it. Tell people about it. When you tell others about your failure and how you tried again, people will gain inspiration from your story. Because of your story, entrepreneurs that come after you may avoid making your same mistakes.

Bottom Line

As Mark Cuban says, you can fail many times but you only have to get it right once to make millions. If you have a great idea for a business but fear failure, move beyond your fears and take the chance. Some might argue that not trying is a fate much worse than failure.