Difficult and, in some cases, career- or life-threatening events are called leadership crucibles. They are trials and tests — points of deep self-reflection that force you to question who you are and what really matters. Characterized by a confluence of threatening intellectual, social, economic and/or political forces, crucibles test your patience, belief systems and core values.
“Experience is not what happens to a man. It is what a man does with what happens to him.”
– Aldous Huxley
The ability to extract wisdom from challenging experiences distinguishes successful leaders from their broken or burned-out peers.
When you’re open to learning from mistakes, problems and failures, you become a stronger leader. You gain followers’ trust, and they’re eager to produce their best work.
Transparent, honest leaders enjoy multiple benefits: learning, creativity, engagement, flexibility and effective communications. Those who take ownership of their role in organizational problems can decode the contexts in which they make choices and how to avoid repeating poor decisions.
After interviewing more than 200 top business and public-sector leaders, authors Warren G. Bennis and Robert J. Thomas were surprised to find that all of them — young and old — could point to intense, often traumatic, always unplanned experiences that transformed their distinctive leadership abilities.
Nelson Mandela, Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Al Gore and Barack Obama have all been willing to talk about their contributions to national failures. As leaders, they thrived because they learned from their mistakes, which inspired confidence, loyalty and commitment even in adverse times.
