Shake It Off: How To Turn Failure into Success
College graduation. Society tells us it’s one of the most exciting times in a young person’s life. What’s not to be excited about? Never having to worry about homework again (okay, almost never) and finally getting to enjoy being an adult on your own terms is pretty awesome, right? But as most graduates can tell you, there’s also that sinking realization that, yup, now you have to find a full-time job.
While this feeling is normal, it’s not necessarily reassuring. Especially not when it currently feels like there is an insurmountable pressure put on college grads to find a perfect, high-paying entry-level role right out of the gate. There’s also a lot of uncertainty in the world, in the industry, and in life after graduation. That’s not going away anytime soon.
As someone who was in these shoes not too long ago, with no clue what to do next and immensely fearful about the uncertainty of life after graduation, I want every college student and grad to know that you’re more ready for the next step than you think.
But, before I get ahead of myself, let’s start with a story.
A Lesson from Taylor Swift’s “1989”
Many of you may be familiar with a little album called “1989” by Taylor Swift. Even if you think you're not, you likely are. From 2014 to 2016, you couldn’t step outside of the house without hearing hits like “Shake It Off,” “Style,” and “Blank Space.”
“1989” also just so happens to be Taylor’s best-selling album of all time (10.9 million in pure sales). To put that into perspective, this is the first time since the release of “1989” that she has achieved two number-one hits on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart from the same album. She’s still competing with an album she released nearly twelve years ago!
“1989” yielded a total of ten GRAMMY nominations and three GRAMMY wins, including Album Of The Year, Best Pop Vocal Album, and Best Music Video for “Bad Blood.” It also hit number one on the Billboard 200, remaining in the top 10 for its entire first year and making it the fifth album ever to do so.
But unless you’re in the trenches of Taylor Swift lore like me, you may not know that this album didn’t start from success.
Early in 2014, Taylor lost Album of the Year at the GRAMMYs for her album “Red.” To say she was devastated was an understatement. After spending years trying to prove herself as a serious songwriter in an industry that didn’t take young female songwriters seriously, the critical reception of “Red” was mixed. Critics noted the album was unsure if it wanted to be country, pop, or both.
That night, Taylor decided to make her next album unmistakably pop. At the time, this was a huge risk. Taylor risked major record label pushback and losing an already dedicated country fanbase. And despite the risk of a massive failure, “1989” became a career-defining rebrand.
Without “Red,” Taylor would not have created this album and become the pop icon she is today. Her “failures” didn’t hold her back. They forced her to evolve and learn—and the same can be true for you.
Failure isn’t a sign to stop and give up; it’s a signal to grow. Failure signals an opportunity to learn, take a new approach, or push past what feels safe.
Famous Failures
Taylor isn't an anomaly. Some of the most recognizable names in the world faced significant failure before redefining their industries.
Lady Gaga was originally signed to the record label Island Def Jam, only to be dropped three months later. But, in 2019, Lady Gaga became the first person in history to win a GRAMMY, Oscar, BAFTA, and Golden Globe in a single year.
Steven Spielberg was rejected by the USC School of Cinematic Arts three times, but is known today as one of the most acclaimed and highest-grossing film directors of all time.
Even though Simone Biles is reportedly the most decorated gymnast in history, she didn’t make the U.S. Women’s junior national team in 2011. However, she went on to win her first-ever World Championships title just two years later in 2013.
Vera Wang trained to be a U.S. Olympic figure skater, but did not make the 1968 U.S. team. Her fallback was fashion. Decades later, she began designing wedding gowns at age 40 when she couldn’t find a dress for her own wedding. Today, she is one of the biggest designers in the fashion industry, with a business worth over $1 billion.
These are some of the best in their crafts, and yet, each failed, some multiple times. Ultimately, they all went on to be extremely successful, and I’ll tell you why. They recognized that sometimes you win, and sometimes you learn. They knew that failure offered a greater opportunity to learn and keep moving forward.
5 Lessons I’ve Learned About Success Through Failure
Believe it or not, I’ve failed in my career (shocker). But I’ve also learned some life-changing lessons from that failure. So let’s take a walk down Failure Lane and see how these lessons helped me be successful in my career and life in general.
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Don’t Take It Personally
One of the first lessons I learned at Nebo is that you can’t take failure or rejection personally, because most times it isn’t.
I remember putting together one of the first big strategies I’d ever led. I prepared for weeks and was so excited to finally show the team all the hard work I had put into the presentation. I wanted to prove myself, but when I presented it to my boss for the first time, he looked me in the eyes and said, “This strategy is not where it needs to be. We need to start over.” The big client presentation was in approximately two days.
As you can imagine, that was the opposite of what I wanted to hear. However, I decided right then and there that I was not going to take the feedback as a personal failure. I was going to learn from the setback, start over, and build something better. And I did.
I learned in that moment that how I react to setbacks is much more of a reflection on me and my work than failure ever will be.
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Move Before You Feel Ready
Most of the time, you won’t feel ready when an opportunity presents itself. And fear can hold us back from reaching our potential.
I was struggling hard with imposter syndrome. I remember thinking to myself all the time, “What if everyone realizes I don’t know what I’m doing?” The truth is that most of us feel this way, from undergrads to CEOs. That feeling never really goes away, but opportunities do, and you have to make the most of them while you can.
Although I didn’t feel ready or like the most qualified person in the room, I said yes anyway. Because I did, I gained real-world experience, ignited a passion I’m good at, and built a network that helped me land my job here at Nebo. That opportunity only came because I was willing to push aside my fear to take on something I knew could help me in the long run.
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Find Value in Every Experience
No experience is wasted unless you decide it is.
In life, not every role will be your dream job. Not every project or team you work with will be a perfect fit. You may even decide the industry you thought you wanted to dedicate your life to isn’t what you wanted after all. (It happens more than you think.) But every experience will give you something.
It could give you clarity on what you don’t like, hard and soft skills you can apply to multiple professions, or connections that resurface later in ways you can’t even predict right now. I used to measure experiences by whether they felt successful, but now I like to measure them by what they taught me.
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Reframe Failure
As we learned from “1989,” failure is a major part of learning for the most successful people, and reframing failure can be one of your biggest competitive advantages.
Longevity in this industry isn’t earned by the professionals who never fail; it’s earned by the professionals who refuse to let failure keep them from adapting.
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Run Your Own Race
With today’s job competition, it’s easy to feel like you're already behind before you’ve even started. There’s so much pressure to be everywhere and do everything, even almost five years into my career.
In times like these, I'm often reminded of a saying my dad repeated to me growing up: “Life is a marathon, not a sprint.” Although it's a cliche, I’ve found just how right it was.
Comparison is a surefire strategy to get in your own way. If you’re so busy looking at the person behind, in front of, or next to you, you’re going to trip. And in life, success isn't who gets to the finish line first. It only matters how you are challenging yourself and living up to your potential, not anyone else’s.
Bet on Yourself
I know just how hard it is to start, especially when it comes to finding your first job. Many students and graduates feel as though they need to figure out the rest of their lives by their early 20s, but employers actually expect that you won't.
What they will expect is your ability to bet on yourself. They'll want to see that you can bet on your ability to learn, your ability to challenge yourself, your ability to adjust when something fails, and ultimately, your ability to succeed.
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