We’ve all been there. You messed up. It happens to the best of us.
First off, acknowledge it. When you make a mistake, own it. There’s nothing worse or more inefficient than trying to dodge it or blame someone else.
At the same time, have grace for yourself. Be kind. How would you talk to a friend in your situation? Probably a lot different than how you talk to yourself. Instead of phrases like “I’m an idiot!” or “what was I thinking?” or “I can’t do anything right,” say instead “These things happen,” “I’m human,” “This is not a reflection of who I am.”
It can be helpful to talk to a friend or grieve the loss if it was a big mistake. You may want to journal about what feelings came up for you. Ask a friend to listen without judgment. The simple act of acknowledging a mistake and having someone “in it” with you can be healing and help you move on. Acknowledgement is the first step.
Secondly, learn from it. Embrace failure as a lesson. The more mistakes we make, the more successful we are. Growing up, I was taught that you were supposed to be perfect. It was about reaching this unattainable goal that no one ever could. That’s what was rewarded, so my cultural conditioning was to think anything other than perfect was bad.
For example, as a kid, I was watching my mom make the bed, she kept spreading her hands over the top of the bed, getting all of the wrinkles out. I remember saying, “Mom, it doesn’t have to be perfect,” to which she immediately retorted, “Honey, if you don’t strive for perfection, you’ll always be mediocre.” Boom. There it is. The issue with that message is that anything other than perfect is unacceptable.
Celebrate your mistakes and talk about them freely. This will reduce their power. Extract the learnings so you can get value from them to move forward.
Third, release it. You have to let it go so you can move on. This is why grieving is so powerful. It creates space to enable you to move on. Mistakes can have a hold on us that is paralyzing and the best thing is to remember that they don’t define us.
Sometimes it’s helpful to name your inner critic to make this easier.
Here’s how it works:
You know the negative voice in your head? The one who says all those awful, discouraging, and judgemental things? If your inner critic had a name, what would that be? The logic is to name it, that act of naming takes the power away.
My inner critic's name is Gertrude. She’s tall, skinny, with long gray hair that's pulled up really tight in a bun with wire-framed cat-eye glasses that sit halfway down her nose. She’s always holding a clipboard with a pen judging me. The idea is to have it feel like it's outside of yourself. Then I could say, "Oh, Gertrude, just relax. It's going to be fine, it doesn't have to be perfect.” That also gives the critical voice feeling some levity.
Here’s how to recover from a mistake when presenting:
When I was first starting out in my corporate training career, when I prematurely advanced to the next slide, I would say “Oops!” out loud. It was so obvious when I messed up. But, it didn’t have to be that way.
Here’s what I learned quickly: if you make a mistake when presenting, the best news ever is this–most people aren’t even going to notice. People aren’t paying that close attention to us. We have very limited attention spans. Most people are thinking about other things and so unless it’s really obvious, it’s likely they won’t even notice.
Here’s what you can do when you make a mistake:
Pause for a second to gather your thoughts. If you’re pausing throughout your whole talk already, it won’t be a big deal to the audience because it will be a part of your cadence. You don't want to show it on your face. Stop, pause, think, and continue on.
If you make a mistake that is blatantly obvious to everybody, say something quickly like, "Excuse me,” or "I was off on that one,” or “I’ll come back and rectify that." You don't have to fall on the sword and pontificate about how badly you feel or profusely apologize. Solve the problem and move on quickly.
It's always a judgment call to decide: is this something I actually need to acknowledge, or can I just move on?
During my workout at the gym once, there was apparently a tech problem. The workout is choreographed with music while we’re on a treadmill and lifting weights. The instructor kept emphasizing the tech problems, "Oh! I'm sorry for these mistakes.”
All I’m focused on is getting a workout. I would have never known the difference, nor did I care. She didn't have to keep bringing up the mistake.
Then what happens is, when we call attention to it, our audience starts focusing on it: "Oh, she did make a mistake. I wonder if she's going to make another one. Maybe she isn't so credible. Maybe this isn't as good as I thought it was,” and we start doubting the person themselves.
Avoid that by simply moving on.
You Control the Experience
Something we don't think about much is that we’re always giving people an experience of us when they’re in our presence. The question is, is it a good one or not? Do people feel drawn toward us, drawn away from us, or is it more of a neutral experience? In other words, are we memorable? And if so, what for?
In my client work, I always invite people to think about this. I love posing the questions: “How do you want people to feel in your presence? or “How do you want people to talk about you when you leave the room?” and “What do you want to be known for as a leader?”
If you start with these questions, you have the foundation of how you want to come across.
You have more control than you think.
If you want to influence, you need to create good experiences. For example, if I'm presenting in a meeting, I have control over my voice. I have control over my ability to smile or not. I have control over my hand gestures, posture, and so on.
If you want to make an impact, what impact do you want to make?
Obviously we can't control how somebody receives us, but we can do everything in our power to come across in a way that best represents us.
This includes how we show up when we make mistakes. The quicker you can acknowledge it (if necessary) and move on, the quicker you can get to influencing.
