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1-Page Summary of Black Box Thinking

Overview

Failure is one of the most frustrating things that can happen to someone. Whether you failed an exam, didn’t get a date with someone or messed up cooking for your friends, failure is failure. It’s what we all fear and it happens to everyone at some point in their lives.

But failure isn’t just annoying and scary. It can also be the opposite of those things. In this passage, you’ll discover how to use failure to your advantage by learning from it and knowing that everyone fails sometimes. You’ll learn why prosecuting innocent people isn’t a rare event; how the invention of the ATM sprang from failure; and how good you are at learning from your mistakes.

Big Idea #1: People are afraid of failure because it compromises their self-esteem.

Children have a hard time admitting they did something wrong. They always deny it, even when the evidence is right in front of them. We are not that different as adults. In general, people hate to admit making mistakes more than they hate making those mistakes themselves!

A look at the criminal justice system shows that DNA testing can prove guilt beyond any doubt. However, it doesn’t work in reverse to show innocence – law enforcement won’t admit they’ve made a mistake.

Take the case of Juan Rivera, who was accused of raping and murdering an 11-year old girl in 1992. He was sentenced to life in prison for his crime. Thirteen years later, DNA evidence proved that he didn’t commit the crime. It took six more years before prosecutors finally agreed with this finding.

So, why is it so hard to admit mistakes? It’s because admitting error compromises our self-esteem. This is especially true when the mistake involves something important.

The prosecutors in the Rivera case may not have been bad people. They may have just wanted to cover up their mistakes, as it is difficult for anyone to admit that they’ve made a mistake. The hardest part of admitting a mistake is admitting it to yourself, because you’re compromising your self-esteem and making it hard for yourself to live with yourself if you do so.

So, the prosecutors probably believed that Rivera was guilty and had some explanation for the negative DNA test other than his innocence.

Big Idea #2: Failure certainly hurts, but it’s a necessary precursor to improvement.

As you saw in the previous key point, it’s difficult to admit mistakes. However, failing face and understanding failure has consequences: It hinders our ability to succeed.

Failure is more than embarrassment. It’s a sign that something isn’t working. If you find yourself failing, it may be time to change your attitude or the way a company is organized.

Every time you miss a basket in basketball, it’s technically a failure. You obviously made a miscalculation or mistake. Maybe you’re holding the ball incorrectly, using too much force, or jumping awkwardly. Every time you fail to make the shot perfectly, you know that there was some kind of error in your technique.

By adjusting your behavior according to the feedback you get from failure, you can improve and succeed. All of those missed shots give you crucial information about how to do it right next time so that eventually you will score.

Nature works in the same way. Species evolve over hundreds of thousands of years, with each generation passing on the mutations that made survival easier. It’s as if each species makes a record of things that almost got it killed to ensure future generations are better prepared for danger.

A team of biologists from Unilever designed a clog-free nozzle by taking the best design from each series and combining it into one.