From Breakdown to Breakthrough

Perhaps the key difference that separates powerful leaders from the rest is how they deal with breakdowns. Most of us respond to failure in one of four ways: we see failure as bad; we hide it; we hope that someone else will fix it; we cast blame (on ourselves, others, the equipment, the market or the weather); or, worst, we reduce our commitment to avoid failing next time. All of which are entirely understandable, and entirely counter-productive. Here are some stories of breakdowns turned into breakthroughs.  

If you ever failed, you are in good company. Here is a compilation of examples of famous failures that I got from http://www.wanttoknow.info/060520inspirationalstories#sthash.J3xNrPGV.dpuf.
(If you don't have time to read this, just watch the video below; you'll get the message.)

Henry Ford failed and went broke five times before he finally succeeded.
Beethoven handled the violin awkwardly and preferred playing his own compositions instead of improving his technique. His teacher called him hopeless as a composer.

Colonel Sanders had the construction of a new road put him out of business in 1967. He went to over 1,000 places trying to sell his chicken recipe before he found a buyer interested in his 11 herbs and spices. Seven years later, at the age of 75, Colonel Sanders sold his fried chicken company for a finger-lickin' $15 million.

Walt Disney was fired by a newspaper editor for lack of ideas. Disney also went bankrupt several times before he built Disneyland. (He is one of the people featured in the video.)



Charles Darwin, father of the theory of evolution, gave up a medical career and was told by his father, "You care for nothing but shooting, dogs, and rat catching." In his autobiography, Darwin wrote, "I was considered by my father, a very ordinary boy, rather below the common standard in intellect.

Albert Einstein did not speak until he was four years old and didn't read until he was seven. His teacher described him as "mentally slow, unsociable and adrift forever in his foolish dreams." He was expelled and refused admittance to Zurich Polytechnic School. The University of Bern turned down his Ph.D. dissertation as being irrelevant and fanciful.

The movie Star Wars was rejected by every movie studio in Hollywood before 20th-Century Fox finally produced it. It went on to be one of the largest grossing movies in film history.

Louis Pasteur was a mediocre pupil in undergraduate studies and ranked 15 out of 22 in chemistry.

When General Douglas MacArthur applied for admission to West Point, he was turned down, not once but twice. But he tried a third time, was accepted and marched into the history books.
After Fred Astaire's first screen test, the memo from the testing director of MGM, dated 1933, said, "Can't act! Slightly bald! Can dance a little!" Astaire kept that memo over the fireplace in his Beverly Hills home.

The father of the sculptor Rodin [The Thinker Statue] said, "I have an idiot for a son." Described as the worst pupil in the school, Rodin failed three times to secure admittance to the school of art. His uncle called him uneducable.

Babe Ruth, considered by sports historians to be the greatest athlete of all time and famous for setting the home run record, also holds the record for strikeouts.

When the first Chicken Soup for the Soul book was completed, it was turned down by thirty-three publishers in New York and another ninety at the American Booksellers Association convention in Anaheim, California, before Health Communications, Inc., finally agreed to publish it. The major New York publishers said, "It is too nicey-nice" and "Nobody wants to read a book of short little stories." Since that time more than 8 million copies of the original Chicken Soup for the Soul book have been sold. The series, which has grown to thirty-two titles, in thirty-one languages, has sold more than 53 million copies.
In 1954, Jimmy Denny, manager of the Grand Ole Opry, fired Elvis Presley after one performance. He told Presley, "You ain't goin' nowhere… son. You ought to go back to drivin' a truck." Elvis Presley went on to become the most popular singer in America.

As Winston Churchill put it: Success is going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm. Or, as he said in his shortest speech ever; "Never ever, ever give up."

What do you think? What stories do you have of breakdown-to-breakthrough? I look forward to reading you on my blog: http://thomaszweifel.blogspot.com/.

P.S. To learn how to manage breakdowns into breakthroughs, check out Chapter 9 of The Rabbi and the CEO: The Ten Commandments for 21st Century Leaders (now available in German and Polish).