My friend Missy is starting a new business as a copywriter. She recently posted about her fear of failure. We all have this fear, no matter our career path or passion.
Failure is necessary in science—we prove or disprove our theories through experiments, we start to understand what works and what doesn’t, and when we fail it’s a valid result that moves us forward. Failure is also necessary in writing and other creative endeavors—it’s how we experiment with new forms and let our imaginations flourish.
But in project management . . . let’s just say failure is discouraged. Project management is all about planning and organizing resources and anticipating risks. Basically, you try really hard to avoid failure at all costs.
I had been wanting to write a Substack on project management for a long time. As a developer of a project management course for scientific staff, I have so much that I want to capture before it slips my mind. Or before I move on to read the next book or design the next experiment. I want it to be a resource for the next person to pick up this torch.
But the first hitch came when I had to request permission from my agency’s ethics office for this outside writing activity. I stalled for a few months. When I finally requested permission—it was immediately granted. So what’s the problem? I had an immediate doubt that I could do this, that anyone would be interested in what I had to say, that mean people would comment about how I didn’t know what the heck I was talking about. Was this imposter syndrome? Realistically speaking, there are plenty of project management experts out there, but how many are scientists, teaching project management to scientists?
My moment of doubt lasted about 4.5 days. Then I started writing. I published my first Substack and came up with a list of 167 ideas of what I can write about. In terms of engagement and subscribers it might not be a total success . . . yet. But that wasn’t my purpose. I didn’t want this knowledge to go away when I moved on to the next project.
At work, I have been asked to start a science-themed newsletter on a different platform. The platform is not as user friendly as Substack. But I have an upgraded attitude this time. I’m going to dive in and just try it. If something goes wrong, I’ll learn and we’ll fix it.
Science (and writing and creative endeavors) should be about discovery, curiosity, inquisitiveness . . . and failure. And in the project management space we can learn to embrace failure as well. Think of it as trial and error. Think of it as being one step closer to a goal.
I’ll keep setting new goals, trying new things, often failing, and moving on to dream another dream. And as my friend Missy quoted: If you stumble, make it part of the dance.
Thanks so much for reminding us that failure is a part of life and can be a great learning experience. We can’t let our fear of failure stop us from trying!