How many times have you set a goal for yourself, only to fall short? Like you, I have failed so many times that I won’t hazard a guess as to how many failures I’ve experienced in my career. But what I have discovered in 20 years of working in the security guard industry, and from life in general, is that you can’t succeed without being willing to fail. No matter how long you plan or how hard you work, you will experience failure some time in your career…and that’s ok. Whether you are a security professional who owns a security guard company, are an account manager for a national security company, or are a site supervisor, you can’t escape that inevitable fact. So what can you do about it?
What Is Failure?
Merriam-Webster defines failure as a lack of success, but its true definition is really up to the individual.
My definition of failure might be totally different from yours, and your definition may be totally different than the next persons. With that being said, let’s talk about something that most people would consider a failure…losing customers.
Recently I had a conversation with a security guard company manager and we started talking about how to rebound from losing clients. Losing a customer, especially a big customer, can be totally demoralizing. When it happens, sometimes you feel like throwing up your hands and just calling it quits. If and when you lose your next customer and feel like giving up, try some of the strategies I use for coping.
3 STRATEGIES FOR SECURITY PROFESSIONALS DEALING WITH FAILURE
STRATEGY #1
First, go ahead and let the feelings of panic and impending doom wash over you — it’s human. When you’ve worked really hard to win a new contract and you end up losing it, it can be demoralizing.
A study that was published in 2017 in the Journal of Behavioral Decision Making explains that people shouldn’t try to ignore the bad feelings they experience after failing. The researchers discovered that thinking about your emotions during times of failure, instead of the actual failure itself, is one of the most helpful things that you can do. In fact, allowing yourself to feel bad can be a huge motivator for some people. In many cases, it will drive you to find a better solution so that you will never experience that particular failure again.
STRATEGY #2
Don’t take it personally, you have to learn to separate that temporary feeling of failure from who you are as a business owner or who you are as a person. Just because you lost a customer doesn’t make you are a loser. Failure happens to everyone, it is inescapable. Again, it doesn’t make you a loser, it just means that you have an opportunity to learn a lesson.
Thomas Edison, the inventor of the light bulb, reportedly failed 10,000 times when he was trying to build that first light bulb. He was quoted as saying,
“I have found 10,000 ways something won’t work. I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward.”
As an experienced security professional, take a lesson from Mr. Edison and analyze why you lost that customer. Scrutinize it to its most minute detail, figure out a way for it not to happen again, and incorporate whatever that fix is into your company’s standard operating procedures.
STRATEGY #3
The third step in this process is…go find some new clients. Just like you lost your customer to another security guard company, there are other potential customers out there who are looking to switch their providers too. Just go find a couple! In tough situations like losing a customer, I often refer back to Kanter’s law which is
“In the middle, everything looks like a failure.”
CONCLUSION
As a security professional, every mistake is a learning opportunity. After you’ve moved past your emotions, it’s important to revisit your mistakes with a new perspective. Look at what you did that went wrong, but also look at what you did that was right, and what you can do better next time. It’s okay to feel defeated in the moment, but losing the battle never means losing the war.
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By Courtney Sparkman
OfficerReports.com is a software company that provides security guard companies with an easy way to monitor their officers, better manage their operations, and win new business. Take a tour of our software to see how we combine Electronic Reporting, Real-Time GPS based Tour Tracking, and GPS based Clock In and Out into one easy-to-use platform.
