Celebrate Failure!

Audrey Cooper

09.23.19

How do you foster an environment where your people feel safe to be creative? According to Audrey Cooper, first female editor-in-chief of the San Francisco Chronicle, celebrating failure is key. According to Audrey, “If you don’t celebrate somebody trying something and failing, then nobody is going to try anything.”

Summary:

How do you foster an environment where your people feel safe to be creative? According to Audrey Cooper, first female editor-in-chief of the San Francisco Chronicle, celebrating failure is key. According to Audrey, “If you don’t celebrate somebody trying something and failing, then nobody is going to try anything.”

Thuy

How do you foster an environment where people feel safe to create?
Audrey_Cooper

Audrey Cooper

It's a really good question. I think the most important thing you can do is celebrate failures. I love saying, "We tried this, and we worked so hard on it, and it stunk! Isn't that great?" And people look at me like I'm crazy but, if you don't celebrate somebody trying something and failing then nobody's going to try anything. So...I'm pretty tough, even before we were getting ready you saw I was proofing and editing copy, and changing punctuation of a story. I'm pretty tough on the level of quality, but once something is out, we celebrate it like you know, it's the most revolutionary thing in the world.