How to Fuck-up

Life is not always sunshine and not everything goes according to plan. Starting new projects, launching products or starting a business – no matter how much planning and even experience you put into making it happen, failure is always an option. FuckUp Nights don’t happen by accident.

The most important thing right at the beginning of this how-to guide: fail fast! Don’t hold on to things that don’t work just because you don’t want to accept it. Let go!

Be prepared!

Before you go into the realization of a project, you can anticipate a lot of things. How? Be prepared for what can go wrong when you start something new. Work on the following points:

• What could go wrong in this project? Where are the risks?
• Why might these risks occur?
• How likely is it that something will go wrong? Evaluate the risks according to their probability of occurrence and the impact they could have! In this way, you create the basis for managing the risks.
• What can I do in advance to prevent risks from becoming reality in the first place?
• What should I do if something goes wrong despite all precautions and planning? Be sure to prepare for this eventuality, even if planning for the worst case currently seems a bit excessive.

How not to fail if something goes wrong

Despite all the preparation and planning, you can never be 100% sure that you have everything covered. There are outside influences that are beyond your control. So what we’re saying is, something could go wrong. But what’s the best way to deal with it if it does?

• No worries: you’ve taken our tips to heart so far and know exactly what to do.
• Manage your Fuck-up. Don’t become a passenger, but always stay in control!
• Get support. You don’t have to deal with everything alone. For many topics there are experts. Maybe even in your team. If you have done everything right in preparation, you will know immediately whom to contact in case of an emergency.
• Crises don’t last forever. So remember: You will get through this.

Everything is a blessing once you learn how to learn from it. – Jonathan Bush

Learn from your fuck-ups

You can make mistakes, but you can’t make them twice! If you can get out of crisis mode, then it’s about working through it.

• Reflect on what went wrong and derive actions to not repeat your mistakes.
• Share your fuck-up and most importantly your learnings with others. This will keep them from making the same mistakes.
• Start right back from the beginning!

When you want to make a difference, it’s important to try things out – and this also carries the risk of failure. However, failure is often associated with a sense of personal defeat. Especially in our regions, fuck-ups are not yet as socially acceptable as they should be. After all, only those who literally dare to do something have a chance to win. Even if in some cases this is “only” an increase in experience.

A small tip at this point: Talk about your setbacks and get external support to work on your learnings with you, so that you can start again strengthened again with the next step.