You’ve heard the axioms: Success is built on failure; failure is a hallmark of innovation; the only absolute failure is giving up. Objectively successful people have long offered advice for navigating defeat—from Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates, who said, “It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure,” to entrepreneur Mark Cuban, who wrote, “No one is going to know or care about your failures, and neither should you. All you have to do is learn from them.” New research, however, suggests the perceived benefits of failure are overrated.
Linking failure to success may be not only inaccurate but also damaging to society, according to a paper published last week in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. Researchers from Northwestern, Cornell, Yale, and Columbia universities conducted 11 studies involving more than 1,800 participants, and found that people overestimate the rates at which failure begets success. Lauren Eskreis-Winkler, PhD, an assistant professor at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management, led the team.
