Katharine Graham? Warren Bennis? Chris Hildyard? E. B. White? Luc de Clapiers? Anonymous?
Question for Quote Investigator: Making mistakes in life is inevitable. Thus, learning to respond resiliently to setbacks is essential. A healthy perspective is presented by the following adage:
A mistake is just another way of doing things.
This statement has been credited to Katharine Graham who was the publisher of “The Washington Post” newspaper and Warren Bennis who was a Professor of Business Administration. I have been unable to find a solid citation. Would you please help?
Reply from Quote Investigator: Warren Bennis conducted numerous interviews with talented leaders to identify principles and techniques employed by superior managers. Bennis and Burt Nanus co-authored the 1985 book “Leaders: The Strategies for Taking Charge”. The book described the adaptive responses of leaders confronting difficulties. Leaders were not discouraged and continued to focus their energies on accomplishment. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:1
They simply don’t think about failure, don’t even use the word, relying on such synonyms as “mistake,” “glitch,” “bungle,” or countless others such as “false start,” “mess,” “hash,” “bollix,” “setback,” and “error.” Never failure.
One of them said during the course of an interview that “a mistake is just another way of doing things.” Another said, “If I have an art form of leadership, it is to make as many mistakes as quickly as I can in order to learn.”
The person delivering the quotation was not identified in the 1985 book; however, in 1994 Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith published a work titled “Learning to Lead: A Workbook On Becoming A Leader”. This book ascribed the quotation to Katharine Graham:2
Most of the people Warren Bennis interviewed for On Becoming a Leader looked forward to mistakes because they felt that someone who had not made a mistake had not been trying hard enough. Norman Lear, writer-producer at CEO Act III Productions, put it this way: “Wherever I trip is where the treasure lies.” Katharine Graham, from the CEO Washington Post, said, “For me, a mistake is just another way of doing things.”
Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.
The quotation appeared in several works that were authored or co-authored by Bennis. The first citation above was the 1985 book by Bennis and Nanus. In 1986 Bennis published a book chapter titled “Four Traits of Leadership” which included a short version of the quotation. Interestingly, the word “simply” appeared, but it was not between quotation marks. Bennis did not specify a precise attribution:3
One CEO said to me that if she had a knack for leadership, it was the capacity to make as many mistakes as she could, as soon as possible, and thus, to get them out of the way. Another said that a mistake is simply “another way of doing things.”
In 1987 Derek Williams published “Time to Live” which included a variant of the quotation credited to manager Chris Hildyard:4
On his own admission, Chris has not always done things well. Failure has occasionally shadowed his bright success; time to achieve is also potentially time to fail. When a project collapses, a relationship goes wrong or a goal is not reached, the natural reaction is to look back and conclude that ‘it’s all been a waste of time’.
Nonsense, he says. ‘Failure is just another way of doing things. Time cannot be totally wasted unless I just consign that experience to a scrap-heap and never try to learn from it.’
In 1989 the quotation appeared in the compilation “The Manager’s Book of Quotations” edited by Lewis D. Eigen and Jonathan P. Siegel. This book contained the earliest attribution to Katharine Graham located by QI although the name “Katharine” was misspelled as “Katherine”. Also, this instance used the word “simply” instead of “just”:5
A mistake is simply another way of doing things.
Katherine Graham
Publisher, The Washington Post
Quoted by Bennis, January 21, 1988
In May 1989 the “Akron Beacon Journal” newspaper of Ohio published a book review of “The Manager’s Book of Quotations” and the quotation in this compilation was reprinted:6
Some succinct one-liners include: . . .
Katharine Graham: “A mistake is simply another way of doing things.” Benjamin Disraeli: “Little things affect little minds.”
In 1993 Bennis repeated the saying again in “An Invented Life: Reflections on Leadership and Change”. This instance used the word “just” instead of “simply”:7
One of them said during the course of an interview that “a mistake is just another way of doing things.”
In 1994 “Learning to Lead: A Workbook On Becoming A Leader” by Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith ascribed the quotation to Katharine Graham as mentioned near the beginning of this article:8
Norman Lear, writer-producer at CEO Act III Productions, put it this way: “Wherever I trip is where the treasure lies.” Katharine Graham, from the CEO Washington Post, said, “For me, a mistake is just another way of doing things.”
In 1995 Warren Bennis and Robert Townsend published “Reinventing Leadership: Strategies to Empower the Organization” which contained a version of the saying using “simply”:9
Kay Graham, the former publisher of The Washington Post, said, “For me a mistake is simply another way of doing things.”
In 1997 Bennis published “Managing People Is Like Herding Cats” which also contained a version using “simply”:10
Most of the people I interviewed looked forward to mistakes because they felt that someone who hadn’t made a mistake hadn’t been trying hard enough. Television producer Norman Lear told me, “Wherever I trip is where the treasure lies.” Katherine Graham, publisher of the Washington Post, said, “For me, a mistake is simply another way of doing things.”
In 2003 “The Big Book of Business Quotations” contained an entry for the saying. Oddly, the words were attributed to 18th century French writer Luc de Clapiers, marquis de Vauvenargues. QI has found no support for this linkage:11
A mistake is simply another way of doing things.
Luc de Clapiers Vauvenargues (1715–47) French soldier and writer. Quoted in Washington Post (January 1988)
In 2011 a webpage at Goodreads attributed the saying to U.S. writer E.B. White. QI has found no support for this linkage:12
“A mistake is simply another way of doing things.”
― E.B. White
In 2012 “The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth: Live Them and Reach Your Potential” by John C. Maxwell attributed the saying to Bennis:13
As author and professor Warren Bennis asserts, “A mistake is simply another way of doing things.” To become intentional about growing, expect to make mistakes every day, and welcome them as a sign that you are moving in the right direction.
In conclusion, QI believes that Katharine Graham deserves credit for the quotation based on the 1985 and 1994 citations. Warren Bennis obtained the quotation from Graham during an interview. The attribution of the saying to E. B. White and Luc de Clapiers is unsupported.
Image Notes: Picture of an eraser from Hans at Pixabay. Image has been resized.
Acknowledgement: Great thanks to Lonneke Boels whose inquiry led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration. Boels noted that the quotation had been attributed to Katharine Graham and E. B. White.
Update History: On April 16, 2024 the format of the bibliographical notes was updated. Also, the full article was placed on this website.
- 1986 (1985 Copyright), Leaders: The Strategies for Taking Charge by Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus, Chapter: Leading Others, Managing Yourself, Quote Page 69, Perennial Library: Harper & Row, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 1994, Learning to Lead: A Workbook On Becoming A Leader by Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith, Chapter 1: Leadership for the 1990s and Beyond, Quote Page 6, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Reading, Massachusetts. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 1986, The Leader Manager, Edited by John N. Williamson (Wilson Learning Corporation), Four Traits of Leadership by Warren Bennis, Start Page 79, Quote Page 87, John Wiley & Sons, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 1987, Time to Live, Edited by Derek Williams, Chapter: First Word: Time to Stop by Derek Williams, Section: Chris Hildyard talking to Derek Williams, Start Page 1, Quote Page 12, Triangle, London. (Verify with scans) ↩︎
- 1989, The Manager’s Book of Quotations by Lewis D. Eigen and Jonathan P. Siegel, Chapter 40: Risk, Quote Page 416, Column 1, AMACON: American Management Association, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 1989 May 15, Akron Beacon Journal, Book Reviews by Katherine Oana, (Review of “Manager’s Book of Quotations” by Lewis D. Eigen and Jonathan P. Siegel), Quote Page C2, Column 1, Akron, Ohio. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1993, An Invented Life: Reflections on Leadership and Change by Warren Bennis, Chapter 3: The Wallenda Factor, Quote Page 57, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Reading, Massachusetts. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 1994, Learning to Lead: A Workbook On Becoming A Leader by Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith, Chapter 1: Leadership for the 1990s and Beyond, Quote Page 6, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Reading, Massachusetts. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 1995, Reinventing Leadership: Strategies to Empower the Organization by Warren Bennis and Robert Townsend, Chapter 9: Thriving Where the Treasure Lies, Remarks from: Warren Bennis, Quote Page 120 and 121, William Morrow and Company, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 1997 Copyright, Managing People Is Like Herding Cats by Warren Bennis, Chapter 13: Creative Leadership, Quote Page 97, Executive Excellence Publishing, Provo, Utah. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 2003, The Big Book of Business Quotations, Topic: Mistakes, Quote Page 260, Column 2, Basic Books: A Member of the Perseus Books Group, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- Website: Goodreads, Article title: E.B. White > Quotes > Quotable Quote, Timestamp on first ‘Like’: Jul 11, 2011 06:31AM, Website description: Goodreads is a large community for readers that provides book recommendations; the site is owned by Amazon. (Accessed goodreads.com on April 23, 2023) link ↩︎
- 2012, The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth: Live Them and Reach Your Potential by John C. Maxwell, Chapter 1: The Law of Intentionality, Quote Page 6, Center Street, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎