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ENGINEER / FORWARD →
with Izzy House
an original column for Hire Perspectives
What if I told you that failure might be one of the most valuable things that could happen to you?
I know. That sounds a little strange, especially if you’ve just experienced a spectacular failure and you’re still trying to figure out what happened.
But think about the moments when you’ve learned the most. The project that went sideways. The idea that fell apart. The challenge that seemed impossible until you finally figured it out. The mistake that made you rethink everything you thought you knew.
Those experiences can be frustrating, embarrassing, expensive, and sometimes painful. They can also be the moments when our skills are sharpened, our thinking expands, and entirely new possibilities emerge.
Some of the most important things we learn come from the moments when things go wrong.
Yet somewhere along the way, many of us learned to fear failure rather than recognize its value.
I think we need to change that.
What Video Games Can Teach Us About Failure
When I talk with young people about failure, I like to use video games as an example.
Think about your favorite game. Imagine that every challenge was easy, every obstacle disappeared as soon as you approached it, and you won every level on your first attempt.
How long would you keep playing?
Probably not very long.
Part of what makes a video game interesting is the challenge. You try something. It doesn’t work. You lose a life, fall off a platform, miss a target, or get defeated by the boss you’ve been trying to beat for the last hour.
So what do you do?
You try again.
Maybe you change your approach. Maybe you practice a particular move. Maybe you explore another route, look for a pattern, or ask a friend how they got past that level.
And something interesting happens along the way.
You get better.
Your timing improves. You recognize patterns you missed before. You develop new strategies. Something that seemed impossible an hour ago becomes something you can do almost without thinking.
Then, finally, you beat the level.
And it feels fantastic!
The challenge is what makes the victory meaningful.
I love talking to young people about this because they already understand the concept. They willingly spend hours experimenting, making mistakes, learning, adjusting, and trying again.
They’ve been practicing persistence, problem-solving, creativity, and resilience all along.
They just call it playing.
In a video game, failure is often what drives us to keep going. We try again because we want to overcome the challenge. But in life, that same experience can stop us cold.
So why does failure feel so different when we encounter it in a classroom, at work, or in our personal lives?
When a Grade Becomes an Identity
Somewhere in the educational process, many of us begin to associate failure with something much more personal.
We take a test and receive a poor grade. We struggle with a subject that seems to come easily to everyone else. We make a mistake in front of the class or receive criticism on something we worked hard to create.
And instead of using that data to adapt, learn, and think, I need to figure out how to do this, we begin thinking, I’m bad at this.
Sometimes that thought grows into something even more damaging.
I’m not smart enough.
I’m terrible at math.
I’m not creative.
I’m just not good at this kind of thing.
A grade that was intended to measure performance on a particular assignment begins to feel like a measurement of the person.
A temporary result becomes a permanent conclusion about who we are.
In Who Do You Think You Are?, we explored how assumptions about ourselves can form early and follow us for years. Failure is one of the experiences that can give those assumptions their power.
But consider what a grade actually tells us.
It provides information about how we performed on a particular assessment, under particular conditions, at a particular moment in time.
That’s useful information. It can help us understand where we are in the learning process, reveal gaps in understanding, and identify areas that need attention. Sometimes we’re still developing the foundation needed to grasp a particular concept. Our minds may simply need more time, experience, or a different approach before something clicks. All of that information helps us decide what to practice, explore, or revisit next.
It is a data point.
And engineers know that data becomes more valuable when we understand what it represents.
A failed attempt tells us something about the attempt. It does not define the person who made it.
Imagine if we treated a difficult math problem the way we treat a challenging video game.
What went wrong? Which part do I understand? Where am I getting stuck? What could I try differently? And just like asking a buddy how to beat a difficult level in a video game, who can I turn to for help?
Suddenly, failure becomes an opportunity to learn, adapt, and improve.
And that changes the experience entirely.
Failure Is Information
Engineers have a particularly interesting relationship with failure.
We design things. We test them. We examine what happens when they encounter conditions they may experience in the real world.
Sometimes a design performs exactly as expected, although rarely on the first attempt.
Sometimes it surprises us, leading us in an entirely new and unexpected direction.
A component breaks. A material behaves differently than anticipated. A system produces an unexpected result. A prototype reveals a weakness that looked perfectly reasonable on paper.
And now we have something valuable.
Information.
We can investigate what happened, question our assumptions, adjust the design, and test again.
Each iteration helps us understand the problem more completely.
In engineering, a test that reveals a weakness can be extraordinarily useful because it gives us an opportunity to improve the design before that weakness becomes a larger problem.
The same principle applies to our professional development.
Maybe you gave a presentation that went poorly. Perhaps you misunderstood a requirement, missed an important detail, or tried to solve a problem using an approach that ultimately proved ineffective.
Those experiences give you information about your preparation, communication, assumptions, skills, or decision-making.
That information gives us a foundation for learning, adapting, and improving.
The real value of failure is found in what we learn and what we choose to do next.
That last part matters.
Because collecting information and acting on it are two very different things.
When Failure Has Consequences
There is another side to this conversation, particularly in engineering.
Some failures carry serious consequences. People can be injured. Infrastructure can be damaged. Businesses can suffer significant losses. Lives can be changed forever.
The Space Shuttle Challenger disaster is a heartbreaking example.
On January 28, 1986, Challenger space shuttle was lost shortly after launch, taking the lives of seven astronauts. The investigation determined that the failure of a seal in the right solid rocket booster allowed hot gases to escape, leading to the destruction of the vehicle.
But the tragedy revealed something far more complicated than a failed mechanical component.
Concerns about the booster seals had existed before the launch. Engineers had identified problems with O-ring performance, and the unusually cold temperatures forecast for launch raised additional concerns.
The night before the launch, engineers at Morton Thiokol, the contractor responsible for the solid rocket boosters, opposed launching under those conditions. The company’s management ultimately reversed its initial recommendation, and the launch proceeded.
The Rogers Commission later identified serious failures in communication, decision-making, and the handling of engineering concerns. Critical information had failed to reach key decision-makers. Technical warnings had been weighed against management judgments, and earlier evidence of seal problems had not led to an adequate corrective response.
Seven people lost their lives.
Challenger reminds us why engineering requires more than technical expertise. It requires judgment, communication, accountability, and the courage to act when something is wrong.
And it brings us to another kind of failure.
The failure to act.
Sometimes we recognize a problem but hesitate to address it. We hope it will resolve itself. We assume someone else will make the decision. We become comfortable with a risk because nothing terrible has happened yet.
Perhaps we have seen the same warning before, and everything worked out.
But a previous success under risky conditions is not proof that the risk has disappeared.
Choosing to do nothing is still a decision. And in engineering, leadership, and life, inaction can carry consequences just as significant as the actions we take.
There is an important distinction here. The engineers who raised concerns about Challenger were attempting to prevent a catastrophic failure. The organizational decisions that allowed the launch to proceed deserve separate examination.
Learning from failure is essential. Learning before failure becomes catastrophic is equally important.
That means creating environments where people can question assumptions, report problems, challenge decisions, and share concerns without fear that speaking up will cost them their credibility or career.
It means listening when someone brings us uncomfortable information. It means recognizing that delaying a project, redesigning a component, or stopping an operation can be an act of sound engineering judgment.
Although the consequences of the Challenger disaster were devastating, the lessons learned led to significant changes in engineering practices, safety procedures, communication, and decision-making. Those improvements have helped strengthen the systems and processes designed to prevent future tragedies.
We cannot change what happened, but we can honor those who were lost by learning from it and using that knowledge to protect others.
And we kept moving forward.
Space exploration continued. Engineers applied what they learned, improved systems, and worked to make future missions safer. The tragedy became part of the knowledge that shaped what came next.
The Beautiful Things That Can Emerge
Now, let’s return to the other side of failure.
The side where experimentation opens doors we never expected to find.
Think about what happens when a project takes an unexpected turn. Perhaps the original approach proves impractical, so the team explores a different solution. An experiment produces a surprising result, and someone becomes curious enough to investigate. A design limitation forces people to think creatively about materials, processes, or systems.
The original goal may change, but the knowledge gained can lead somewhere remarkable.
This is one of the things I love about engineering and innovation.
We begin with an idea of what we want to create. We make assumptions about how something will work. We develop a plan and start building.
And then reality joins the conversation.
Sometimes reality agrees with us. (But what fun would it be if everything worked perfectly the first time!?)
Sometimes reality has other ideas.
That’s when curiosity becomes especially valuable.
What happened? Why did it happen? What does this tell us? What else could we do with what we’ve discovered?
A failed experiment can reveal a new possibility. An unsuccessful prototype can inspire a better design. An unexpected obstacle can encourage a team to explore an approach they might never have considered otherwise.
Thomas Edison understood this. After conducting thousands of experiments while developing a storage battery, a colleague questioned whether all that work had produced any results. Edison reportedly replied:
“Results! Why, man, I have gotten a lot of results! I know several thousand things that won’t work.” — Thomas Edison
What a wonderful way to look at experimentation! Every unsuccessful attempt had taught him something. Every result helped narrow the possibilities and informed what he would try next.
Failure was producing knowledge, and that knowledge was moving him forward.
Sometimes the most beautiful outcome is something we couldn’t have imagined when we started.
That doesn’t mean every failure produces an innovation. Some attempts simply teach us that an idea needs more work, a different approach, or a new direction.
And that knowledge has value, too.
The opportunity lies in remaining curious enough to recognize what the experience has taught us.
The Courage to Try Again
Of course, understanding the value of failure intellectually is much easier than experiencing it emotionally.
When something matters to us, failure can hurt.
We invest time, energy, creativity, and sometimes a little piece of our identity into what we’re trying to accomplish. We want our ideas to work. We want to do well. We want the people around us to recognize that we’re capable.
And when things go wrong, disappointment is a natural response.
Give yourself room to feel it.
Then, when you’re ready, look at what happened with the curiosity of an engineer.
What worked? What surprised you? What assumptions need updating? What did you learn about the problem? What did you learn about yourself?
Maybe you discovered a skill you need to develop. Maybe you learned that you need a different kind of support. Perhaps you recognized a strength you didn’t know you had. Or maybe you simply got better at something through practice and persistence. And sometimes, you discover that the direction you were pursuing has changed, and something else now deserves your attention.
Each of those discoveries can help you move forward.
There is also something worth recognizing about the act of trying.
Every meaningful challenge involves some uncertainty. We make decisions using the information available, prepare as well as we can, and move toward an outcome we cannot completely predict.
We can manage risks, seek advice, test our assumptions, and improve our chances of success.
But growth also requires us to encounter things we have yet to master.
You build confidence by gathering evidence that you can learn, adapt, and find your way through challenges.
That evidence accumulates over time.
Think about the difficult things you’ve already learned to do. The problems you’ve solved. The situations you’ve navigated. The moments when you had to figure something out as you went.
At one point, many of those things were unfamiliar. Today, they’re part of what you’re capable of doing.
I like to think of knowledge as an onion. Every experience adds another layer. Each layer brings new information, new skills, and a different perspective. As those layers build, you begin to see familiar problems through a new lens. Connections emerge that you might have missed before, and possibilities appear that you couldn’t have imagined when you first started.
And you gained that perspective because you did the things. You tried, you struggled, you learned, and you grew.
What Happens Next?
In Outside the Pipeline, I asked readers to think about who they wanted to become.
In Who Do You Think You Are?, we examined the assumptions that influence how we answer that question.
In What Do You Bring to the Table?, we explored the value we create through our skills, qualities, experiences, and contributions.
Now I want you to consider something else.
What have your challenges taught you about who you are becoming?
Think about the challenges you’ve faced, the plans that changed, the mistakes that taught you something, and the times you had to ask for help, rethink an approach, develop a new skill, or find the courage to begin again.
Those experiences are part of your story.
They may reveal persistence, adaptability, creativity, judgment, curiosity, humility, or the ability to remain focused when circumstances become difficult.
And perhaps they reveal something you would like to develop further.
Remember that video game?
The difficult level becomes manageable because you keep learning. The obstacles that once seemed impossible become familiar. Your skills grow, your strategies improve, and eventually you discover that you can handle challenges that would have overwhelmed you before.
Life is certainly more complicated than a video game. Some losses are permanent, some risks require extraordinary care, and some experiences change us in ways we never would have chosen.
But the invitation to learn remains.
Failure can be an ending. It can also be the beginning of a better question, a stronger skill, a different direction, or an idea that changes everything.
Actions & Outcomes
Challenges give us opportunities to learn about our skills, assumptions, judgment, and ability to adapt. These exercises will help you examine experiences that shaped you, recognize the capabilities you developed, and turn what you learned into evidence you can use throughout your career.
Keep your answers. Like the Evidence List and Point of Value exercises from earlier articles, they can become part of a growing record of your development and a resource for building confidence.
1. What happened when things went wrong?
Think of three experiences when something went differently than you expected. Choose examples from school, work, a personal project, or another meaningful part of your life.
For each experience, write down:
-What was I trying to accomplish?
-What actually happened?
-What made the situation challenging?
-How did I respond?
Describe what happened as accurately as you can, separating the facts of the experience from the conclusions you may have drawn about yourself.
Outcome: A clearer understanding of the challenges you’ve faced and how you responded to them.
2. What did I learn?
Return to those three experiences and look for the information each one provided.
Ask yourself:
-What worked, even if the overall outcome was disappointing?
-What assumptions turned out to be incomplete or incorrect?
-What skills or knowledge did I gain?
-What would I approach differently today?
-What did I learn about myself?
Look for the capabilities that developed through the experience. Perhaps you became more resourceful, learned to communicate more clearly, developed better judgment, or discovered the importance of asking for help.
Add those discoveries to the Evidence List you started in “Who Do You Think You Are?”
Outcome: Specific evidence of learning, growth, and capabilities developed through challenges.
3. When should I act, and when should I stop?
Think about a situation in which you recognized a warning sign, an emerging problem, or a decision that deserved closer examination.
Consider:
-What information was available?
-What concerns or risks did I recognize?
-How were those concerns communicated?
-What action was taken, and what happened as a result?
-What would responsible action look like in a similar situation today?
Now consider the consequences of taking action, waiting, or choosing not to act. Identify who could be affected by each decision and what information would help you make a sound judgment.
Outcome: A stronger understanding of how judgment, communication, and timely action contribute to responsible problem-solving.
4. What became possible because something went wrong?
Choose one experience that forced you to change your approach.
Ask yourself:
-What did the original plan look like?
-What new information changed my understanding?
-What alternatives became possible?
-What did I create, improve, discover, or learn because of the change?
-How might I apply that learning to a future challenge?
Sometimes the result will be a better solution. Sometimes it will be a clearer understanding of what to avoid, what to explore, or where to focus your efforts.
Both are useful.
Outcome: A greater ability to recognize opportunities for improvement, creativity, and innovation when circumstances change.
5. What’s my next level?
Think about something you’ve been hesitant to attempt because you are uncertain about the outcome.
It might be learning a technical skill, applying for a position, presenting an idea, asking a question, taking on a leadership responsibility, or pursuing a project that stretches your abilities.
Imagine approaching it as you would a challenging level in a video game.
-What am I trying to accomplish?
-What skills or information would help me?
-What could I practice or test in a manageable, responsible way?
-Who could help me learn?
-What would my first attempt look like?
-How will I use what I learn to decide my next move?
Choose one action you can take this week.
Then take it.
Outcome: A practical first step toward a challenge that matters to you, along with a plan to learn and adapt as you progress.
Remember: Every challenge you work through adds to the evidence of what you’re capable of becoming.
About Izzy House
Izzy House is an author, aerospace communications strategist, and marketing leader who believes education and inspiration have the power to transform lives. Through her writing, speaking, and work with leaders across the commercial space industry, she promotes the exciting world of space and inspires people to pursue careers with purpose.
As the author of both business and children’s books, Izzy believes curiosity, continuous learning, and meaningful relationships create opportunities at every stage of life. Her writing helps readers understand complex ideas, communicate with confidence, and recognize the unique value they bring to the world.
Inspire the child who might become an engineer.
Develop the engineer who might become a leader.
Empower the leader who might change the world.
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