Over the holidays, I was introduced to an Asian comedian, Ken Jeong Tran, being interviewed on a talk show about her recent and highly successful comedy tour. During the interview, the host showed several clips of her hilarious performances at live events in Las Vegas, New York, and Los Angeles, but he also showed a clip of her failing in front of a live audience. She was performing in a small, local comedy club where she was clearly struggling with her material, receiving little to no laughter from the audience.
When he asked about the difference in her performances, she said, “The failure at my local comedy club is the reason for my success in the big theaters.” She went on to say that she purposely and continuously books these sessions at her local comedy club to practice new ideas. She felt strongly that experimentation, with its requisite failure, is a requirement for all great comedians. Without it, they will fail more publicly, and often permanently.
She said she had grown to love the gift and process of purposely trying on new material in a small, low risk setting to figure out what worked and what didn’t. She noted that it was part of her craft to fail, citing that there was no other way but to experience firsthand how an audience would respond to different material and varied timing. This process of failing was what gave her great confidence to perform in high stakes venues before larger audiences. Failure was her (and all comedians’) secret weapon.
I pondered this idea of how a professional comedian could not only seek out and anticipate failure as a tool for success but even come to enjoy it. My experience as a trainer and coach, as well as a professional speaker, has shown me the value of trial and error, practice, and failing, but the reality is that most of us don’t enjoy it and certainly don’t look for ways to create it for ourselves.
But what if we did? We know as professionals that the way to garner the biggest professional rewards of financial and professional success is to perform at the highest levels with our biggest audiences, clients, or patients and in high-stake moments such as interviews, presentations, sales conversations, or negotiations. What if we decided, in advance, to create ongoing practice sessions where we pushed ourselves into new territory with advanced skills that would raise the level of our expertise. We already know we will stumble and fail with our first attempts to think, speak, react, and perform differently. But, what if that was built into the process? Would we not, like Ken Jeong Tran, become more comfortable with the experience and potentially even learn to value and look forward to the process?
This is exactly what we do at LionSpeak with our clients. Whether they are trainers and coaches who want to move their trainees to higher levels of mastery and garner high praise from workshop attendees about how engaged and valuable the sessions were or they are an owner or team leader who wants to build a team that is accountable, highly skilled, and innovative or they are a speaker looking to move their audience to inspired action, they all need practice, which means they need a safe place to try on new material, new verbal skills, and new ways of thinking.
As a leader in your business, as a speaker from the stage, or as a trainer, having a positive mindset around ongoing growth, practice, and failure is essential to being and staying at the top of your field. Finding a coach that can create a safe space for you to move out of your comfort zone and into the stretch zone, breaking through the barriers that hold you back, is also essential.
This week, consider the value of practice and failure. Make space for it and dedicate time to it. Find a coach who can help you create that space and walk beside you as you work out the kinks, get better, and rise to the top of your craft.
If you need a recommendation, we just might know some very experienced coaches! 🙂
Here’s to a 2025 filled with the kind of failure that creates massive growth both professionally and personally for all of our LionSpeak community.
“Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.”
– Robert F. Kennedy
Comments
This is a fabulous Monday Morning Stretch – thank you for posting. I look forward to my Monday morning email from you each week.
Thank you, Brenda! So happy you are looking forward to the MM Stretch each week. Makes my heart sing!