Presentation by Tom Murphy in Ashford Castle as part of #cong17, CongRegation unconference in Cong, Mayo, www.congregation.ie. Tom presented on Innovation and Failure
Innovation is from the latin Novus meaning “new” and Innovare “to change”. Modern translation “to try to change”.
What is the difference between "to do" and "to try"? To innovate IS to risk failure.
This is how school teaches us to look at things. Pass/Fail dichotomy
This is a better example of the relationship, tho.. I’m a mathematician so this still seems simplistic.
Lets talk about failure in wood turning. Failure at 2000 RPM is fast and its conclusive. It can even be fatal.
Suceess and obsession with success can be styfling.
<story of the woodturner of the year in local chapter>
Charlie: Wish you hadnt... could be the worst thing that has happened to you
<problems of being afraid to fail>
Sometimes failure is the mother of invention
Tree-Goblets
Giving yourself the freedom to fail can be liberating.
Dragon Vase
Failure is scary because we rarely have a bounding box for how bad things might get when we fail. Limiting damage allows you to experiment. Sand pit, play pen, etc
The observant will notice that the bowl in the picture is spalted elm, while the bowl in my hand is paduak!
Learn from your mistakes. Moving forward past a failure is all about
We would never willingly go towards failure... so by definition, failure can bring us to places we would never otherwise get to. Teach us things we would never otherwise learn. Give yourself the freedom to fail and all sorts of things can happen.