Mistakes happen. The crucial question is: how do we deal with them?

In an age of rapid change and increasing complexity, the ability to learn from mistakes has become a strategic success factor. Yet in many companies, blame, fear and perfectionism still dominate. In his lectures, experienced pilot, communications expert and speaker Peter Brandl shows how companies with a positive error culture can not only become safer, but above all more innovative and efficient.

Positive error culture: between desire and reality

Most companies want employees who take responsibility, make courageous decisions and break new ground. But what happens when mistakes are made? The quick response is often: ‘We need a positive error culture!’ – But reality and expectations are often worlds apart. Instead of learning, fear dominates: mistakes are covered up, glossed over and someone is blamed.

Peter Brandl knows this dilemma from two worlds – aviation and business practice. In both, the aim is to identify mistakes early on, make them transparent and learn from them. This is the only way to minimise risks and enable further development.

What constitutes a positive error culture

A genuine, constructive error culture is based on three fundamental principles:

1. Transparency and openness: Errors are not concealed, but openly addressed – regardless of hierarchy.
2. No blame: The aim is not to ‘get someone’, but to understand the causes and avoid future errors.
3. Psychological safety: Employees must feel confident that they can admit their mistakes and talk about them without fear of negative consequences.

Psychological safety, a concept developed by Harvard professor Amy Edmondson, is particularly important here: only those who feel safe will be brave enough to try new things – and thus enable innovation.

Why a culture of error is decisive for corporate success

In an accelerating world, standing still means falling behind. If you don’t try anything, you can’t learn anything. But innovation arises where mistakes are understood as part of the process. Whether it’s penicillin, Scotch tape or the ice lolly – many groundbreaking ideas owe their existence to a mistake.

A learning organisation recognises this potential. It creates spaces for exchange, e.g. through formats such as Brandl’s ‘campfire circle’, where people talk openly about their own mistakes. The effect: collective learning, growing error competence and a genuine cultural change.

From blame culture to gain culture

Peter Brandl distinguishes between a ‘blame culture,’ which is all about guilt and punishment, and a ‘gain culture,’ which sees mistakes as a resource. The transition to this is not a foregone conclusion. It starts with leadership – with trust, setting an example and the courage to admit one’s own mistakes.

Error management is not a ‘nice-to-have’ skill. It is a prerequisite for innovation, agility and sustainable corporate success.

‘Error culture is a management task’

If you want innovation, you have to allow experimentation. And if you allow experimentation, you also have to expect mistakes. The question is not whether mistakes will happen – but how we deal with them.

In his keynotes and workshops, Peter Brandl impressively sums up why a healthy error culture is not a ‘soft skill’ but a survival strategy – and how it can be implemented in concrete terms.

Experience a keynote by Peter Brandl that changes perspectives and makes change possible.

More information and availability on request: +49 (0)30 640 777 42 or peter.brandl@leading-minds.com