To Err is Human

120422

Mistakes are inevitable, we make them all the time. In fact, if you're like most people, you probably make a mistake at least once a day. This simple statement can be applied to almost anything in life: You're likely going to forget your wallet at least once before 2016 ends. You might mix up the names of two individuals you know who look similar or have similar names. You might even burn your toast one morning.

But do these mistakes diminish us as individuals? No! They allow us to form our identity, learn from our mistakes and eventually get better.

The same notion applies to businesses and brands on the internet. We all make mistakes, but what's important is that we learn from them and improve for the next time around.

In the digital space, there are numerous ways a business or brand can misfire. Either through content, product, or customer service issues, mistakes are bound to happen. But as business owners and brands, we must acknowledge this as a reality of doing business digitally, which shouldn't deter us from moving forward with our ambitions. If anything it should push us to learn more so we don't make the same mistake twice.

One thing I have learned through my journey of online entrepreneurship is that mistakes are bound to happen, you just have to learn from them and bounce back from them. Everyone makes mistakes. And, that’s okay! To err is human.

Once upon a time, EhmDee was building the app - but in his haste, he made some errors and published them in the app store. The app store ratings plummeted! And, all was terrible.

EhmDee started to fret and fret even more when he realized his mistake. He wondered if he should just go away forever and close up shop. But, as he sat there with his head in his hands, a friend came to sit by him and handed him a cup of tea.

"You are only human," said Master Oogway. "You are not perfect, yet neither are your customers." With these words of wisdom, EhmDee geared up again and set about fixing things. He remembered that it was the little imperfections that gave things character and appeal. He remembered that people’s good points far outweighed their bad points. He remembered the most important thing of all: the power of gratitude..

There is a saying that goes, "to err is human", the implication being that no one is perfect.

One of the things we have found out at EhmDee that has helped us improve our performance over time is the emphasis on continuous improvement. There are 5 basic principles for continuous improvement:

1. Start with the end in mind - know what you want by asking yourself what business results your action will generate and what value this will deliver to your customers.

2. Define your current reality - a good way to do this is by asking what do you want to achieve, do you have measures in place to tell you how well you are doing?

3. Develop hypotheses - make informed guesses about what might be the causes of your current state and then think about how you can change these to get better results

4. Test your hypothesis - take action and measure the results using metrics that are leading indicators of where you want to go. Correct and repeat until you get there

5. Act on feedback - succeed or fail, feedback tells us what works and what doesn't so take time to reflect, learn and if necessary change then act again

EhmDee's commitment to continuous improvement has helped us improve our performance over time thus making our customers happier.