Celebrate Failure? Hard Pass.

In just the past few weeks, I’ve heard the phrase pop up in three separate conversations:

“We need to celebrate failure.”

I understand the intent. It’s about reducing fear and encouraging risk-taking. A noble goal. But I think it’s the wrong message—especially right now.

For many people, fear isn’t some abstract concept that sits quietly in the back of their minds. It’s real. It’s watching a respected colleague get laid off and wondering if your name’s next on the list. In environments like that, “celebrating failure” doesn’t feel like a courageous rallying cry. It feels disconnected. Even reckless.

And let’s be honest, nobody wants to fail.

What we should be celebrating is the thoughtful bold attempt. The person who sees a stuck problem and takes a smart, gutsy swing at it. The one who steps outside the process and tries something new. And if the attempt doesn’t work, let’s celebrate the fast learner who listens, adjusts, pivots, and doesn’t lose momentum.

There’s a great story from Creativity, Inc. by Ed Catmull and Amy Wallace (great book, btw) about a time when Disney Animation was stuck. A major technical problem had brought a project to a crawl, and a culture of fear was keeping the team frozen. But three animators—unprompted—spent their weekend working through a different approach. By Monday morning, they had cracked the code. What had been projected to take six months was solved in days.

Could they have failed? Sure. Maybe the fix wouldn’t have worked. Maybe someone else would’ve done it better. But they took a smart shot.

The goal isn’t to fail. The goal is to move forward. To replace inertia with momentum. And momentum comes from action, from reflection, and from the courage to try again if it didn’t work—smarter this time.

So let’s celebrate courage. Celebrate learning. Celebrate thoughtful resilience.

If you want a culture that moves fast and solves problems, reward the ones who think, act, reflect, adjust, and move again.