Sunday, August 10, 2008

Is Failure An Option? Yes It Is!

There is no word called “Failure” in the today’s entrepreneur’s dictionary. This is the state of mind of many startups I had met. Failure is not an option! That’s the battle cry of the entrepreneur. Is this is Right?

If “Failure is not an option” what happens if you fail? If I am right more than 50% new business will disappear in the first two years. I am sure this number will be very high, especially if we consider the startups that are started in spare bedroom and closed by that time next relative arrives.

So what do you do if you’ve decided that failure is not an option? Do you commit suicide when you end up among the majority of start-ups that crash? A small percentage of entrepreneurs actually take this grim avenue. I wouldn’t recommend it. I think a wise entrepreneur needs to have plenty of options, including failure.

Many of us don’t want to allow “Failure as an option” into your consciousness, fearing we may doom ourself to it. The advice many of us get from so many of the so called self improvement books is to not to allow failure word in the dictionary. Because of this many of new entrepreneurs seem to believe that reality is little more than the projection of will. Thus, if they commit to the belief that “failure is not an option,” they will not fail.

May be I am wrong! Please let me know your comments!



Note: Thomas Edison had 2000 failed attempts at creating an effective light bulb.

1 comment:

Abhishek Parolkar said...

Good thought, But I certainly believe "Failure is NOT an option" because "Failure is a fundamental step and we never get to choose it , it only happens" hence the question to ask is, "Shouldnt Entrepreneur , by definition, have more appetite for failures and ambiguities?"