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5 Rules For Coping With Failure From A Founder Leading The Conversation On Effing Up – Forbes


Failure is one of the few inevitabilities of business, but despite how common it is, it’s rare that entrepreneurs, business owners, and professionals talk about it openly. One woman, through a radically-named organization, is changing that. 

Leticia Gasca and her friends wondered why when entrepreneurs and professionals gathered, they only talked about success and never failure. So, they chose to have a candid conversation about their mistakes, and Gasca had an epiphany.  “I felt so guilty that I decided to hide my failures…I realized we all have hidden failures. That night was an exorcism for me and made me realize that sharing my failures made me stronger…made me connect with people more deeply,” Gasca recalled.  

Gasca and her co-founders decided they wanted to invite others to join the conversation and experience that catharsis, and the very first “fuckup night” was hosted in Mexico City in 2012; seven years later, that night spawned a business: Fuckup Nights, Inc. (FUN). The co-founders knew that including the f-word in their name might create challenges, and noted that they’ve had potential sponsors pass on the project in the past, but they “stand strong because [they] do this for the community, not for some potential sponsor that wants to hop on the bandwagon.” 

The organization’s approach is as radical as the name: since the first event they’ve hosted monthly events (approximately 1000 events per year) where industry-leading professionals (approximately 1 million attendees world-wide) candidly share their biggest mistakes and the difficult lessons they learned along the way to rooms full of strangers. FUN has a constantly growing global reach, with events in more than 330 cities across 86 countries in over 30 languages. 

Two and half years ago, one Toronto woman helped them add one more in Canada’s most populous city. Marsha Druker first experienced the movement while living and working in Tel Aviv, Israel, and she said the event was like a breath of fresh air. “The community of people just felt different. People were open and willing to be there with no judgment. And I’d never seen speakers share stories like that,” Druker explained. 

When Druker returned to Toronto in the fall of 2016, she found herself struggling to find a job and make connections. After working with innovative startups in ‘Startup Nation,’ she felt like this meant she was failing.

That’s when she remembered her time at FUN. But when she went looking for a Toronto chapter to volunteer with, she discovered the organization hadn’t yet reached her city. So, she got in touch with the founders and got their go ahead to bring the event to Toronto. 

It was Druker’s first brush with event curation, but she paired her entrepreneurial spirit with the guidance of a mentor to lay the groundwork and a team of volunteers to keep things running smoothly on event day. Still, it was no easy task. Recruiting speakers and promoting the event was challenging, and it was difficult to find a space that would host an event with such a bold name. 

Despite the uphill battle, FUN Toronto’s first event in March of 2017 was more successful than Druker could have even imagined. Today, the event continues to be a hit, with the city being one of the largest and most active of all the chapters. 

While Druker points out that Toronto is still more conservative when it comes to talking about failure that other startup ecosystems like Silicon Valley, she attributes the success of  FUN Toronto to the city’s diversity of people and industries, a tight and collaborative entrepreneurial community, and a unique focus on the way failure impacts those around them. 

Druker herself is becoming something of an expert on failure, but she mentions that her relationship with failing is still a work in progress. However, she’s constantly learning and improving and has developed some helpful habits and practices she agreed to share:

Don’t Let Your Failure Define You

“As entrepreneurs and business owners, when you encounter a business failure, it can make you think that you as a person are a failure,” Druker pointed out, adding that this is especially true for women, who tend to internalize failure as a reflection of their lack of ability. Her advice? “It’s important to separate yourself from your failure.” 

Don’t Go It Alone 

“You need to surround yourself with a supportive network of people like other entrepreneurs or professionals in your field,” Druker suggested. “If you’re dealing with a failure, take the time to connect with somebody about it and share what you’re going through.”

Don’t Sweep It Under The Rug 

“Take the time to be mindful of your failure. Extract the key lessons and take time to heal. Depending on the failure, therapy might be something that you feel is right for you. It’s highly encouraged by a lot of our speakers.” 

Don’t Neglect Your Wellbeing 

Druker advised that it’s important to “cultivate habits like practicing gratitude, meditation, physical exercise—really anything to get you out of your head and be able to move past your failure.” 

Don’t Rush The Bounce Back

On the popular ideas of ‘failing fast,’ ‘failing forward,’ and ‘failing up,’ Druker cautioned, “I think [those ideas] allow people to quit and walk away before it’s time. And that really ignores the trauma that comes with failure. So, I think it’s important to make sure those terms are applied to specific things like tech and marketing sprints, not general failure.”

The FUN team is working to turn lessons like these and the more than 330 case studies collected from FUN speakers from Toronto and other cities around the world into useful data by contributing to the organization’s Global Failure Index. 

“We’re looking through that data and finding patterns that can help influence public policy and industry practices. It’s really aiming to help people learn from actual case studies of failures or mistakes that could happen based on factors like the size of their business, their gender, or their specific industry and use that information to propel their business forward,” Druker explained.

Other projects in the works include theme events that target specific industries like retail, blockchain, sports and entertainment, and restaurants to broaden the movement’s reach, and bringing concept into schools to influence the next generation. 

“We want to really embed this philosophy into young people and show them that it’s okay to fail and equip them with the tools to deal with that failure.” 



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