A New Twist on Age-Old Advice

The old adage about learning from your mistakes still resonates today, but with a new wrinkle: learn from your mistakes and do it quickly.

That’s the lesson Allstate CEO Tom Wilson learned during Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

As soon as you identify a problem, address it. Wilson says the company knew it was overexposed in the Gulf Coast region prior to the devastating hurricane but didn’t act on it.

The quicker, he says, you resolve issues the better prepared you will be for the next problem that arises – and it will, soon.

Does your business have a “lessons learned” practice? If not, engage a diverse team of employees to work with leaders on developing one.

You may get some ideas by watching Wilson’s interview: