On Mistakes

Bohr redefines expertise as complete mistake coverage rather than complete knowledge. This reframing has been liberating for me. If expertise requires making all possible mistakes in a domain, then mistakes aren't obstacles to mastery - they're the path to mastery. I've noticed this in my own learning: I became genuinely skilled in areas where I'd made every possible error at least once. Those mistakes created a map of the territory that no book could provide. The expert isn't someone who never makes mistakes; they're someone who's already made your mistake and knows what comes next.

Jones captures something darkly funny and true: experience doesn't prevent mistakes, it just gives you the ability to identify them faster the second time around. I've laughed ruefully at this quote many times while making familiar errors. The value of experience isn't that it makes you infallible - it's that it makes you faster at recognizing when you're screwing up. That faster recognition allows for faster course correction. The experienced person still makes mistakes, they just don't make them for as long before noticing.

Collins taught in inner-city schools and understood that the fear of mistakes is what prevents learning. This quote has helped me in creative work especially. The perfect draft that never gets written because you're afraid of writing it badly. The product that never launches because it might have flaws. The conversation that never happens because you might say the wrong thing. Collins reminds us that making things requires making mistakes. The choice isn't between making mistakes and making things. The choice is between making mistakes or making nothing. When framed that way, mistakes become acceptable collateral damage.

Mayo - founder of the Mayo Clinic - identifies two dangerous types: those who claim perfection (liars or self-deceived) and those who refuse to learn (stubborn or stupid). This quote has shaped my hiring philosophy and my self-assessment. I don't want to work with people who pretend they don't make mistakes, because that means they're either dishonest or lacking self-awareness. But I also lose patience with people who make the same mistake repeatedly. The sweet spot is honest acknowledgment plus active learning. Mayo's prayer has become my standard for both myself and colleagues.

Thomas was a physician and biologist who understood that error isn't a bug in human design - it's a feature. Evolution works through mistakes (mutations). Learning works through mistakes (trial and error). Innovation works through mistakes (experiments that fail). We're literally coded for error at the DNA level. This biological perspective has helped me be more forgiving of my own mistakes. If evolution designed me to make errors, then beating myself up for making them is fighting my own design. Better to accept that mistakes are inevitable and focus on learning from them.

Joyce provides an alternative framing: what looks like a mistake might actually be an experiment. This has been useful when working on creative projects where "correct" hasn't been defined yet. The supposedly wrong color choice that becomes a signature style. The "error" in code that reveals a better approach. The social misstep that opens unexpected conversations. Joyce suggests that genius lies in being willing to make intentional errors - to deliberately try the "wrong" thing to see what happens. This requires confidence and curiosity in equal measure.

Drucker's observation devastated my risk-avoidance strategy. I thought being careful would reduce my error rate, but Drucker suggests you make roughly the same number of big mistakes regardless. The cautious person makes mistakes of omission (missed opportunities), while the bold person makes mistakes of commission (failed attempts). Either way, about two per year. If that's true - and my experience suggests it is - then you might as well take risks, because you're paying the mistake price anyway. This quote helped me become more willing to attempt difficult things.

Buddha identifies the two fundamental errors: never beginning, and beginning but not persisting. I've made both mistakes repeatedly. Projects I never started because the first step seemed too difficult. Projects I started but abandoned before completion because the middle was harder than expected. Buddha suggests that the path to truth (or any worthwhile destination) requires both initiation and persistence. The mistake isn't in the journey's difficulty - the mistake is in failing to journey at all, or in journeying partway and turning back. This has helped me push through the difficult middle phases of projects.

Berra's malapropism accidentally contains wisdom: there are wrong mistakes and right mistakes. Wrong mistakes are the repeated errors Mayo warns against - making the same mistake twice because you didn't learn. Right mistakes are the ones Bohr describes - making all possible mistakes in a domain to become expert. Or Joyce's volitional errors that open portals of discovery. This quote makes me laugh every time, but it's also made me think about mistake quality. Not all errors are equally valuable. Some mistakes teach you nothing. Others teach you everything.

This anonymous quote captures the difference between forgivable error and unforgivable pattern. Make the mistake once - that's learning. Make it twice - that's not learning. Make it three times - that's a pattern you're choosing. I've used this quote in retrospectives and post-mortems to distinguish between "we made an error" (acceptable) and "we made the same error we made last quarter" (unacceptable). The metaphor of an encore is perfect - nobody wants to see the same mistake performed again. Once was enough.