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“Fail Forward Fast” by Pia Lord

Guest post by: Pia Lord

Article Overview: In today's fast moving world, we have to get on the track and start going. It would be great to have every piece of information that we ever dreamed of before making a decision. Sometimes that is not possible though. A philosophy of Fail Forward Fast gets us there by allowing a decision to be made, action to occur and then reflection immediately afterward. There is no downtime involved but staying the course, the right course.

“Fail Forward Fast” by Pia Lord



About two years ago, I heard someone say the phrase ”Fail Forward Fast”. At the time I had no idea what it meant. But it is one of those intriguing phrases that just sort of stayed with me. At the time I was trying to figure out which path to take, where to go and what to do. I was, you might say, at a crossroads, not that I had not been at such a place before. However this time, that crossroads or that fork in the road ended up being a mere passing point instead of a reflection or stopping place. Other times I would have halted, my life would have been in a quandary over a simple decision to make.

But once I heard “Fail Forward Fast”, I never had a problem making a decision again! Miraculously, from that point on, regardless of what it was, I would just zoom ahead with my plans, and look at the result. If the result was less than expected I would change my outlook or change my goals, or change my approach in someway. There was a sort of freedom that I now felt. Decisions were no longer a burden upon my shoulders. Path in the roads which went here and there, I just took which ever I felt like taking,

which ever I had an inkling for marching down. I remember driving in my car thinking “why did I not get this before?”. Literally, I now take “fail forward fast” to mean don’t worry if you think you are on the right or wrong path, just go down and go down as quickly as you can to find out. I now see that any and every path in life is just an experience.

However now with the Slight Edge in mind I also see that I already know the right decisions to make versus the wrong ones. I think we all do. But the philosophy of fail forward fast gives you a tremendous amount of experience from which to learn from, even though, like any failure, it may not always or even ever be pleasant. I spent one year studying in Annecy France as a Rotary Exchange student. While there I came across a history professor who impressed me with his phrase “Dans la vie il faut faire un travail de reflexion”. Loosely translated this French phrase means, Reflect upon what you do in life to have a good journey. Combining the philosophy of fail forward fast with a pause or more to reflect upon the experience I see is vital to get on the right path and make sure that you are staying on the right path. Even business schools are now adopting this modus operandi with students and research project. They say get going and do something and then we will talk about how it went. The youngster who invests and saves early is far better off in the end than the one who does nothing and waits. But the person who makes everyday count in terms of savings will always have enough. Each moment in life is a jewel of a chance to carve your diamond. Life is in the precious moments. Like that one that just went bye. Tempus Fugit. It waits for no man, woman or child. Cultivate each single moment of each day and your harvest will be plenty.

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Article Tags: business education, downtime, entrepreneur, fail forward fast, philosophy, reflection
Referred by: http://jaykubassek.com



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