Reading Reflection No. 2

How to Fail at Everything and Still Win Big

Scott Adams

1.    The authors general theme is about accepting failure. The title doesn’t really hide anything, it describes the methodology to taking some of the worst outcomes someone can have and turning them around to help you in the next stage.

2.    I feel like this book can relate to anyone that has gone through failure throughout their life. As for this course, I have gone through failure a few times already. Missing early points and feeling like it was over already made me want to give up but seeing the future opportunities and setting weekly and daily goals like this book described helped me gain my confidence back. As entrepreneurs, we can find ourselves with many failures before we find success but the will to push and set certain goals that are achievable on a short-term basis can help bring entrepreneurs to successful ventures.

3.    One exercise for this class that I think would be great is to have the students put into teams and revamp old business ideas that weren’t a success. There are so many failed ideas out there, some because there was no market research done, some didn’t have that intuitive edge. I think students would get a good idea of the creative thinking and successful tactics needed to progress with a business venture.

4.    My ‘aha’ moment was reading about the short-term goals the author emphasizes. I took a sports psychology class last semester and they talked about setting small goals in order to achieve the bigger ones. Think of it as stepping stones to the big stage. Seeing that same train of thought in this book made me realize how big of an impact that mindset can have on any aspect of life.