No matter how seasoned you are in business, there is one thing that’s inevitable.

Failure.

You will fail at something or come up short on your objectives. And while that may be inevitable, we have the choice in how we react to failure.

Today I’ll be taking you through my process as I dealt with my own setback this week.

Learn more at https://www.adamliette.com

Discover how to work with me: https://www.adamliette.com/work-with-me

Transcript

Adam Liette
What's going on smooth operators, welcome to this week's episode, you know, I was planning on doing something a little bit different. I was gonna go into marketing systems, because it's, it's like, I asked about this all the time with my clients. And like everything else, like marketing needs a system, it needs a game plan. And if we're not operating from a game plan, it's only a matter of time before it all falls apart. And then I had a couple of things happen this week. Some things that kind of rocked me some things I didn't see coming, and some setbacks. And I'm quite comfortable enough to admit, I have setbacks too. You know, we all do. And if you say no, I don't, you're lying. You know, you do. If we're in the business, if we're running teams, if we're putting offers out there, rejection happens, things don't happen according to plan. And so what do you do in that moment? You know, I've worked really, really hard on my own professional and personal development, on how to respond in moments like this. But each time it happens, it still rocks me to my core.

Because we work so dang hard for what we're after. And we get quite emotionally involved in what we're doing. You know, that's part of being in this business. You know, there's that classic saying, it's not personal, it's just business. Like do this, like one of the most personal things I do I share stuff on this show that I've never shared with people before. I've been pretty vulnerable with you guys. I think if you've listened to more than a couple episodes, you can tell that. And vulnerability is a good thing. Vulnerability allows us to grow from those experiences. So what do you do when things fall apart when things don't work the way you intended them. And if you think over the course of your business, like how many different things can happen, a campaign doesn't go well, a promotion flops. A team member leaves, a partnership dissolves. You know, the number of different things that can happen are all over the map. But I know people personally that if they have trouble with their computer at wrecks their whole Dang day. And it's just a computer man, like get over it, you know? But what do you do when something really happens that rocks you to your core. So I'm just going to walk you through some of the things that I do not because I'm right, but because this is what works for me.

And this has been very deliberately built over the years things that I've developed and now it's almost instinct when when I know something, or when something happens that is a setback. I just jump into my plan, I jump into my own strategies, and I allow myself to go through those. And it's it's now happening a lot quicker while go through like the five stages of grief and about like 12 hours. It wasn't always that way. And the setbacks could just rock me for days on end. But you can't allow yourself to be that way. Like we have to get back on that horse we have to at least get ourselves back to a place of like positive output. As long as we get to that place you're not going to fix it. That's not the purpose of it, of this exercise is you're not going to fix it it's already done it broke period and so accept that. But how do you get yourself back into positive momentum positive outputs so you can start recovering from the best way possible which is through work so the first thing I do is I when I do have a setback you know I allow myself to feel that moment you know here well don't get mad get even or something dude, allow yourself to get mad.

Allow yourself anger. Allow yourself disappointment. Allow yourself that moment and get it out of your system. be pissed off. Curse at the wall. Whatever you got to do. You all know your own individual ways of expressing your anger. So why fight it, just go lean into it, find a place to be angry. Get away from the computer, if that's what you do. And allow yourself to feel. Stop fighting it, you're going to eventually, so just do it right away. Allow yourself that moment. That helps to record it. If it helps to go into the woods and shoot a gun or something, whatever it is, allow yourself that anger. Don't pretend it's not there. Because that's only going to exacerbate the situation. After I've allowed myself to be angry, allow myself to feel that's where my network kicks in, where I am able to confide in someone. And confiding in someone without the expectation, they're going to fix it. And I'll usually even like, put as a precursor, like, hey, there's nothing you do about this. But can I just vent to you brother. Like, I just got to vent. And if you're on the receiving end of that, like don't try to fix someone's problem when they're venting to you. That's kind of the the hidden undertone of all this is like for you to really be successful in using steps like this, you got to be reciprocal, and be able to help others do this as well. So like, you're going to be the sounding board for someone to if you end up employing this tactic.

And that's cool. That's, that's, that's real growth when you're when you're able to do that for someone else. But be able to confide in someone take that anger that you just expressed, okay, now you got anger out, now you need to talk to someone about it and talk to someone about it. Again, we're not trying to solve it, all we're doing is now taking that internal anger, internal frustrations and telling it to someone else. Someone else that we trust. It's amazing what happens when you have actually have to say something out loud, to someone else. There's a lot of things that come from that a lot of clarity, a lot of peace that comes from that, and it's artists way. But say it out loud to someone else. From there, I just like to take a step back, you know, step three, take a step back, remove myself from the tactical, whatever that caused this to happen. Take a step back and start looking at the bigger picture. What else do I have on my plate? What else is coming? What can I learn from this situation? What can I take away? What do I need to discover more so I can really understand what happened. So we're going through all these layers, right these levels. And now we're getting to the point where we want to understand but you have to first take that step back. And now you're able to go into the next step, which is analyze what happened.

Take a look at all the data you have available back and forth, emails, metrics, whatever it is. And just look at what happened. Try to piece together this puzzle. It'll try to analyze it on the fly, just be gathering be looking at the raw data that you have in front of you. So that you can be able to actually analyze it. Just look through what you have. More than likely you're going to find little tidbits in there that are like oh, gosh, I should have seen that. Oh, well. Based on that I should have known. Go figure we're getting like a point 1% click through rate on that email campaign. I can't believe it flopped, right? Obviously, that's just absurd example, but you get the point. The point is, the data will tell us what's happening. Move out of emotion, move into data, let data tell you the story, which is then going to get you to the next point which is like what are the learning points that you can take from this situation? I know one thing for sure. It's that my greatest breakthroughs and the biggest areas of growth in my life have always come from places of despair and failure. And it's because places of failure gave me things to learn. They gave me lessons that I could employ and a lot of those Raleigh's internal lessons like I did that wrong, or I did this wrong or I wasn't doing this. So I got to shape up, right?

But take that moment look at what are the learning points? What can we take away from this? What were the signs? And if we could do it all over again, what would we do? What would you do? Oh, you can almost replay it in your head and go back and say, Well, I probably would have done this, that and the other thing, well, great. Like, this is not gonna be the only time you're faced with this situation, right? It's coming again. And it's those learning points that are going to be have you in a better place, be better prepared to face them in the future, and to maybe navigate them a little bit differently for a more positive outcome. And at this point, you can learn it further. Or you can move on and get excited about another project. So what's next? What's the next thing you're gonna get dive into? You'll hear a lot of people say, Well, you just got to fail fast and move on. Yeah, I get it. But sometimes we're carrying that failure with us. Some of us aren't the best moving on, without at least taking the time to go through steps like these. And the more practice you get out at the better. But if you're experiencing like real failure, for maybe the first time, it's going to be a gut check. So go through these kinds of steps, before just moving on, and taking on what's next.

Because we need to get to what's next, it does feel better. You feel like you're back in a place of contribution, which feeds our souls as visionaries, and leaders, we want to be adding at all times and building and making a difference. But if you're still carrying that weight with you, it's only a matter of time before it bogs you down, and starts to drag you down. This is a long game. This this building an online business or building a team. It is a long game, in doing the right thing to take care of yourself, your own mental faculties, in the heat of the moment will never disappoint you.

So I want you to just to think about the next think about this, the next time you experience that failure, you're still going to be learning from it. You're not going to get this right. The first time for sure. And you might even lament your own progress through these steps and how you deal with failure. But I think probably the healthiest thing for you to do right now. And you're listening to this episode. If you're not experiencing this right now. No, don't think but no, you will fail. It is inevitable. But you get to make the choice in how you respond to it. And how you gird yourself and how you ultimately point yourself in the better direction. I hope this helped this was kind of like one of those downloaded episodes. And I really want to talk about marketing strategy. Like I said, we'll do that. On the next solo episode. We have some great interviews coming up. But I felt like that was a strong enough message to send, especially since I dealt with it just in the last, you know, like 48 hours read a huge opportunity that was lost. And I had to go through all those phases. And it's okay.

Like I said, it doesn't mean I'm less of a business person doesn't mean unless I'm an entrepreneur, it just means I failed just like everyone else does. And if sharing something like that on the podcast, like make you think twice me Well, we went to like each other anyway. Because I I believe in like being brutally honest with you guys about this, this thing called building a business. And I hope that helps man. I hope if it just helps one person when you hear this at the right time, you're able to better navigate it. Like you're gonna be better off for a brother.