creativity

IntelligentFailure.docx

Intelligent Failure

Creative Leadership and Problem Solving | Online Exercise # 5

Introduction

This online exercise asks you to reflect upon a past failure in order to transform it into what Rita Gunther McGrath labels an "intelligent failure." Critical reflection and producing a culture that embraces, indeed, rewards failure is essential for long-term innovation and coaching colleagues (and oneself) to facilitate creative growth. In other words, facilitating intelligent failure smooths out the innovation process and enhances the creativity of one's teammates.

Note, due to the personal nature of the stories, you'll be able to post anonymously for this online exercise.

Process

1. Reflect upon some past failures that ended up becoming invaluable learning experiences. Select one that you'd like to share with classmates; use your judgement in terms of what is appropriate for our online discussions.

2. Write a brief story that frames your failure as an inciting incident that proved transformational. Provide enough background context so that your readers can understand and appreciate the challenge/failure, why what you learned proved so valuable. The minimum length requirement is two grammatically complete paragraphs.

3. Post your story to the forum. Read your colleagues stories and provide affirmative comments on 2 different posts.

Evaluation

This online exercise is worth 5% of your final grade. Later, you'll have the opportunity to revise and further reflect upon the exercise via the Portfolio.

For this submission, the online exercise will be evaluated via degree of completion by answering ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to the following statements:

1. The post shared a story about intelligent failure that was a minimum of 2 paragraphs in length.

2. The story framed the failure as an inciting incident in which the author encountered a challenge that facilitated positive change.

3. The story provided enough background context so that anyone could understand and appreciate the narrative.

4. The author provided affirmative comments on two other posts created by classmates.