Mistakes? I've made a few...

Friday 20 July 2007 at 9:57 pm Mistakes are a part of life and business, everyone makes them, but it is human nature not to want to admit we make them. Some people never admit them even to themselves, let alone someone else. We hope our mistakes are minor and do not require telling anyone about them. In basketball they refer to this as "no harm, no foul". The only fouls that count in basketball are the fouls that the referee calls. This generally works to the player's advantage except in the closing seconds of a close game. That is when the referees seldom call fouls and on those rare occasions when they do. The coaches, players, and fans of the team that does not benefit from the call voice their objections rather vigorously. Makes you wonder if the refs had called all the "no harm, no fouls" earlier in the game. A foul called at the end of a game would not matter that much. In any event, we will never know. Because I am not the supervisor of basketball referees that is not my call (pun intended).

However, what should we do about the "no harm, no fouls" we make?  We tend to overlook most of them and focus only on the big ones. The truth is your boss, colleagues, board of directors, husband, wife, kids, etc. will notice the big ones. So, we need to watch the little ones.

Since every mistake has a consequence. We need to understand that the minor mistakes that go unresolved will eventually add up to be a major mistake. Since we are supposed to learn from our mistakes, it should not be that big a deal to recognize them, accept them, and deal with them. Yet it is.