unSILOed with Greg LaBlanc

514. Embracing and Growing Through Failure with John Danner


Listen Later

Is it time to drastically change the way we think about failure? What if failure is the key to success? 

John Danner is a faculty member at UC Berkeley and Princeton University and the author of Built for Growth and The Other “F” Word. His research focuses on leadership, strategy, and innovation. He regularly consults with Fortune 500 companies, offering actionable strategies to help them adapt to ever-changing landscapes and grow. 

John and Greg discuss the paradox of Silicon Valley’s celebration of failure and the reality behind it, turning regrets into strategic resources, the importance of self-knowledge, both for individuals and organizations, and how understanding your personality can influence successful entrepreneurship.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

**This episode was recorded in 2021.**

Show Links:

Recommended Resources:

  • Thomas Edison 
  • Daniel Kahneman
  • Mark Coopersmith 
  • Jeff Bezos 
  • Barry Schwartz | unSILOed 
  • Sara Blakely 
  • Ben & Jerry’s 
  • Jack Ma

Guest Profile:

  • Faculty Profile at UC Berkeley
  • Professional Website
  • Profile on LinkedIn

His Work:

  • Built for Growth: How Builder Personality Shapes Your Business, Your Team, and Your Ability to Win 
  • The Other "F" Word: How Smart Leaders, Teams, and Entrepreneurs Put Failure to Work
Episode Quotes:

Embracing failure leads to growth

03:33: There's something quintessentially human about failure that connects all of us because we are all experts at it. We do it all the time in very unexpected ways, yet we tend too often to walk away from it, to ignore it, to not talk about it. And it's become, I think, a taboo unto itself, but also, from a leadership point of view, in my experience, both in teaching, consulting, and running organizations, starting organizations, it is a huge barrier in most organizations that I'm familiar with. If you can't talk about failure, if you can't genuinely, honestly, openly discuss it and understand what's behind it, you're never going to be in a position to actually leverage and benefit from it.

Failure is like gravity

12:11: Failure is like gravity. It is a force and fact of nature. It is inexorable and unavoidable, and it's not a strong force of nature. It's a weak force of nature, but it is the kind of phenomenon that I think we're dealing with.

The value of failure

02:41: What failure almost always is: reality's way of telling you that you weren't as smart as you thought you were, you were conducting an experiment all along, and it's reality that's telling you what you didn't know but thought you did. So, it's got some value for sure.

How can we embrace failure without being overwhelmed by it and use it to improve the odds of success

25:21: How can you both accommodate the likelihood of failure but not be overwhelmed by it, not ignore it, but manage through it and, more importantly, perhaps manage with it because failure is a little bit like the coal that holds the diamond; there's insight in every failure. There is something of value that is there to be mined if you have the humility to acknowledge it and the tenacity to go after it. And to that extent, I like this notion of thinking of initiative and action as chances to improve your odds that the experiments you're conducting are more likely than otherwise to prove successful.

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

unSILOed with Greg LaBlancBy Greg La Blanc

  • 4.6
  • 4.6
  • 4.6
  • 4.6
  • 4.6

4.6

59 ratings


More shows like unSILOed with Greg LaBlanc

View all
EconTalk by Russ Roberts

EconTalk

4,217 Listeners

a16z Podcast by Andreessen Horowitz

a16z Podcast

1,027 Listeners

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch by Harry Stebbings

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

518 Listeners

Conversations with Tyler by Mercatus Center at George Mason University

Conversations with Tyler

2,387 Listeners

Decoder with Nilay Patel by The Verge

Decoder with Nilay Patel

3,141 Listeners

Odd Lots by Bloomberg

Odd Lots

1,772 Listeners

Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy by Colossus | Investing & Business Podcasts

Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy

2,313 Listeners

Azeem Azhar's Exponential View by Azeem Azhar

Azeem Azhar's Exponential View

613 Listeners

Hidden Forces by Demetri Kofinas

Hidden Forces

1,437 Listeners

Capitalisn't by University of Chicago Podcast Network

Capitalisn't

525 Listeners

Google DeepMind: The Podcast by Hannah Fry

Google DeepMind: The Podcast

199 Listeners

Dwarkesh Podcast by Dwarkesh Patel

Dwarkesh Podcast

390 Listeners

Big Technology Podcast by Alex Kantrowitz

Big Technology Podcast

422 Listeners

Clearer Thinking with Spencer Greenberg by Spencer Greenberg

Clearer Thinking with Spencer Greenberg

128 Listeners

"Econ 102" with Noah Smith and Erik Torenberg by Turpentine

"Econ 102" with Noah Smith and Erik Torenberg

145 Listeners