Delivering effective feedback takes skill & finesse, and it will not always be easy or comfortable. Effective feedback can be respectfully uncomfortable without being damaging, offensive, or humiliating.

Our ability to relate to, train, teach, elevate, & inspire others is directly related to our ability to achieve competence and mastery WITHOUT forgetting how we got there.

If we spend most of our lives in the Unconscious Competence state, it takes some deliberate disruption to break out of that comfort zone.

A girl, her dog, and a saga of failure and innovation.

So, if we can accept what the science says - that self-compassion is good for you, makes you more resilient to failure, and protects against depression & anxiety - why is it so damn hard to actually DO?!?! The fact is that we talk to ourselves more than any other person, and for most of us, the conversation is repetitive and not very positive.

After SHE, I found that I couldn’t allow myself to remain stuck. Thinking about and asking for what I wanted to see in my own career and personal life was fundamentally different because I had more language and tools to name and push for myself. The self-reflection also helped me to really think about where to push - where to prioritize and focus.

Failure Lab - SHE is a passion project. It is the collaborative culmination of a fantastic community of women trainers, facilitators, creatives, and executives. Failure Lab - SHE exists because it is what the women around us, including ourselves, needed, but couldn’t find.

Here are a few of our favorites from 2023 (it was hard to narrow it down to only 8). Some of these fall squarely in the “Leadership & Development” space, but most do not, or they dance on the edge. However, we would argue that if you are truly looking at Leadership & Development from a human-centric lens, ANY book that helps you to better understand humans and/or offers a different or new perspective IS a Leadership & Development book.

There is an abundance of data that shows increased levels of productivity, effectiveness, employee engagement, reduction in attrition and employee turnover, and a host of other “bottom line” metrics in teams and organizations that have high levels of psychological safety, emotionally intelligent leaders, and culture-forward priorities.

Fear of failure is directly tied to perfectionist behaviors, which have been directly correlated to chronic stress and burnout.

“Perfectionism and the fear of failure go hand in hand: They lead you to believe that success isn’t about doing something good, but about not doing something bad” (Arthur C. Brooks, 2021).

Raise your hand if you keep thinking to yourself (or out loud), “If I just get past XYZ I am sure that my life will be a lot less stressful,” or, “We MUST be getting close to the end of this seemingly endless state of global burnout. Right?!?!?”

Whatever your specific situation, here are a few considerations to mull over as you contemplate your best strategy for getting your employer to invest in your professional development. And because we reeeaallyyy want to set you up for success…keep reading along for a sample of what you can send to your supervisor for your professional training request!

Cultivating curiosity and learning is one of the most critical components of living a fulfilled and meaningful life. We believe that learning and growth in any area of life improves the quality of life - in all areas. That being said, let’s focus on Professional Development (PD) and why professional development is so important.

Instead of focusing on finding the unicorns, perhaps the wiser course of action is to think about what an organization must embody in order to foster loyalty and enthusiasm. If you already have an employee engagement strategy or program, but are not seeing the type of commitment that you would like to see…..what is going wrong?

Fact: Corporate training doesn’t fail due to a lack of good content.Fact: Corporate training doesn’t fail due to a dearth of inspired speakers and facilitators.

Corporate Training Fails in the Before & After.