Failure Is Nothing More Than A Chance To Revise Your Strategy:

We set lofty goals for a reason: to challenge ourselves to succeed. But what happens when your organization misses the mark? It’s natural to feel embarrassment, disbelief, and anger in the face of failure. There is often a desire to assign blame, or to avoid addressing the failure altogether. “Let’s just move on and try again.” Unfortunately, these knee-jerk reactions impede your organization’s ability to derive valuable insights from your failures and identify actionable opportunities.

Yes, you should move on. Yes, you should try again. However, there are valuable steps you can take first to inform your next moves. If you can build a culture that supports failure, and implement procedures that help you report and analyze what went wrong, you’ll be poised to identify opportunities and take action based on your findings.

Adoptive a Culture of Failure

Create and Communicate a Procedure for Analyzing Failure

Record and Present Your Findings

Identify Opportunities and Take Corrective Action

For example, if your campaign failed to meet its fundraising goal, one action item could be to extend the campaign timeframe and send out another appeal. Donor Drive found that 42 percent of donors visit a donation page more than once before making a donation. Use your failure as an opportunity to reach out again and call potential donors back to your donation page. Link to the failed campaign in your email communications so individuals who already donated understand why they are getting asked to contribute again. Explain what you think led to not meeting this goal. Whether unforeseen expenses or unclear messaging hindered your success, explain what action you’re taking to move forward and ask for their support again.

Not all failures are as obvious as missing a fundraising campaign goal. There is always room for improvement, even when a campaign exceeds your expectations. Use these steps to set up a regular “checkup” for your organization in order to keep improving.

We would love to hear what systems your organization has in place for analyzing and communicating failures. Let us know in the comments below.