LEADERS ARE PERSISTENTFailures must be recognized as soon as possible. It is better to bury a
corpse than to perfume it!^2Every great leader has had MANY failures in their leadership journey. In
fact, many have had far more failures than they have had successes. They
have learned to quickly “cut their losses” and move on. They do not try
to ignore or rationalize their mistakes and failures. Nor do they try to
blame others for their own failures. Instead, they humbly “name and claim
their failures” ASAP. Rather than deceptively trying to cover-up their
failures – or “perfuming the corpse” of their mistakes – they immediately
go proactive. They take whatever remedial action necessary to correct
things. They bury their failures – rather than allow their failures to bury
them.
It is a leader’s persistence that will not allow them to quit in the face of
failure. Leaders have learned that some of their greatest lessons came
through failure. They often refer to the “school of success” as the “school
of hard-knocks!” It was those series of “hard knocks” through falling
and failure that broke them so that God could really use them. Note these
wise insights about failure...
- “The man God chooses to use, He must first hurt him
very deeply” (A.W. Tozer). - “Breakthrough happened around me when break-up
happened within me” (Pastor Jack Hayford). - “Those who fail in the task of leadership are among its
best teachers; for in their glaring mistakes and distorted
values we at least see what we must avoid, with a clarity
often harder to discern in those more successful.”^3
God redemptively uses the failures and fallings in our lives to break us
of our “self-sins”: self-centeredness, self-importance, self-will, self-rule, self-
sufficiency, and self-satisfaction. This is one of the ways that God turns
our blunders into blessings. It is when a leader becomes vulnerable about
his failures with his followers that he is most helpful to them. A leader’s
vulnerability about failure becomes the “highway of hope” and the “bridge
of blessing” on which others can walk away from their own mistakes and
defeats. People are often more encouraged by our failures than by our