Everyone has heard the adages about using failure for growth. But those sayings don’t give you much insight regarding how to use failure to move forward. In fact, much of managing failure involves active decisions on your part. So, before you let a failure ruin your day, here are some tips to take that experience to get you moving in the right direction.

Most people are their own hardest critic, but beating yourself up over the outcome doesn’t help you move forward. In fact, it can make it practically impossible to learn from the experience at all. So, don’t take a failure as a reason to give yourself a hard time. Instead, look at what went right and how you can learn from the parts that didn’t. That way you get the most value from the failure without any of the guilt.

Sometimes we perceive an event as a failure simply because our expectations weren’t realistic. While it is perfectly fine to shoot for the stars in some situations, make sure that reach them is actually possible. Otherwise, you may be setting yourself for disappointment simply because what you had in mind wasn’t actually achievable under normal circumstances.

If you find yourself facing a failure, and you aren’t sure what to do, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Often, we find ourselves hesitant to bring in someone else when we think a project isn’t going well. However, getting a fresh perspective and new ideas on the table might find the path between failure and success.

Remember, in the vast majority of cases, asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness; it’s a sign of intelligence and self-awareness.

It’s easy to talk about taking action, but spending more time discussing what to do than actually doing it won’t help turn a failure into a success. Once you have a plan in place, you have to move forward. Otherwise, you’ll never have the chance to see if a positive outcome was even possible.

Surrounding yourself with people who are certain failure is on the horizon won’t help you find solutions, only problems. So, if you find that everyone around you is pulling you down, consider involving other people to keep yourself moving forward.

When a project focuses more on current trends than on your capabilities, you might find yourself in over your head. It is important to be realistic about what you know how to do and what you don’t. Then, if you find yourself lacking in a particular area, you can learn from the experience and build the skills that would have created a success. Or, you can bring in outside talent to help turn the failure into a success.

Often, failure is a mindset. If you decide that failure isn’t how you will define the outcome regardless of what happens, then you can find yourself embracing new opportunities for what they have to offer either way.

If you are interested in pursuing new employment opportunities, the professionals at The Advance Group can help you increase your chance of success no matter the outcome. Contact us today and see what is available in your area.