Failure Builds Resilience and Antifragility

True resilience means being able to persevere, despite experiencing failure, volatility, or periods of uncertainty. Demonstrating flexibility, optimism, emotional agility, and strong problem-solving skills, truly resilient individuals survive and learn from their setbacks. 

Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who coined “antifragility,” argues that being antifragile goes beyond resilience. Rather than simply reacting to and surviving a failure, being antifragile means embracing the randomness of unforeseen setbacks and developing an increasing ability to pivot and adapt. Antifragility is learning and thriving because of failure and adversity.

We are not born resilient or antifragile. Both are learned skills, a combination of certain traits that develop as a response to challenges. These traits include optimism, the ability to keep emotions in check (but not suppressed), a sense of security, and an established social support network. These traits are often developed in response to challenging experiences.

Emotional Agility

Emotional agility, especially when faced with volatility, uncertainty, complexity, or ambiguity (VUCA), is a critical component of becoming antifragile. As defined by Palena Neale, Ph.D, PCC, “emotional agility means holding these emotions loosely and looking at them not as directives, but simply as data to help us take value-based actions.” Being agile with your thoughts and feelings enables you to respond optimally not only in everyday situations but also in times of crisis or uncertainty.

According to Susan David and Christina Congleton, there are four practices that enable the development of emotional agility:

1. Recognize your unique patterns to avoid being “hooked by thoughts, feelings and behaviors that don’t serve us”;

2. Label your thoughts and emotions - they are transient and may “sap important cognitive resources that could be put to better use”;

3. Accept them to enter into a resourceful state; and

4. Act on your values, which will help you prioritize and expand your choices.

Like other traits that enhance resilience, emotional agility can be learned. By acknowledging your transient emotions and focusing on your core values when evaluating possible situational responses, you are better equipped to pivot, adapt to difficult situations, and solve problems with a greater chance of success.

Source: “What VUCA Really Means for You” by Nate Bennett and G. James Lemoine (Harvard Business Review Magazine, January - February 2014)

Committing to a decision that may or may not result in failure requires courage and a commitment to learning from the outcome. Those who don’t commit are often more risk-averse (and less resilient) and therefore unable to act during a situation that falls into one or more of the VUCA categories.

“Courage means having the confidence and fortitude to make a decision when there is no obvious right or wrong decision.”

- Strategy + Business

Those who have experienced failure and grown from the experience often possess traits of humility and compassion. David Kenny, the former CEO of The Weather Company, argues that these are the types of individuals you want to have on your team.

“I love hiring people who’ve failed. We’ve got some great people here with some real flameouts. If they’ve done it once and… learned from it, they’re so much better because they took a risk. They’re much more humble, much more of a contributor to the culture, and they do great things because they learned.”

True resilience is approaching failure not as the final outcome, but as a part of the process of learning, adapting, and perpetually developing yourself. Rather than falling backward if you hit an obstacle, bounce forward with optimism from your previous experience and the courage of your convictions. True resilience (or antifragility) is a critical skill you can develop by being mindful and accepting of your emotions. Failure is an opportunity to propel yourself forward both personally and professionally.

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