I’ve been inspired by Sir James Dyson’s recent blog post, “No Innovator’s Dilemma Here: In Praise of Failure,” which reminds us that we learn more from our mistakes than from our successes. Plus it means you’re taking risks, which is where true innovation and success can happen.
Your organization’s innovators are not the only ones who need to be reminded that it’s okay to fail. We need to remind ourselves too.
Sometimes the best-laid plans do not work out so well. And when those failures are not due to incompetence or negligence, there are lessons to be learned. And we shouldn’t be afraid to acknowledge that, and we should be willing to share those lessons with each other.
Sharing our tech transfer “war stories”—especially the battles we fought bravely but lost—helps others (and ourselves) see the warning signs and avoid the pitfalls. (Am I mixing metaphors here?!)
I’ve been doing tech transfer long enough that I have several stories to share myself. A few have been shared in Fuentek’s “Stories from the Field” blog series. But I know there are others out there.
So I am looking for a few brave souls from university tech transfer offices to join me at AUTM 2012 in a panel called “That Didn’t Go as Planned (and What I Learned).”
If you are willing to share your war stories (changing names to protect the guilty), please contact me by April 29th.
By Laura A. Schoppe
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