The Weight of Leadership When You Fail

Leadership isn’t about titles, pay grades, or who’s at the head of the table. It’s about one brutal truth: when things go wrong, the buck stops with you.

I was reminded of that in the hardest way this week.

On Sunday, I walked into work and found the plant in a mess. Unknowns everywhere. Decisions needing to be made. I gathered my leadership team, we laid out what we knew...and what we didn’t....and I made the call to ramp the plant back.

At the time, it felt decisive. Responsible. The right thing to do. But in the loopback, new information came to light. Crucial information that never made it to the table because of a communication breakdown between night shift and day shift. Whether it was misunderstood or simply missed, the gap mattered.

And because I made the call without it, the decision was wrong. A wrong decision that carried serious consequences for the business.

I know the reasons. I know the process was sound. But in leadership, outcomes matter. And at the end of the line, the buck stops with me.

The Doubt That Lurks in Failure

What’s floored me more than the event is the doubt that followed.

• Am I really capable of this role?
• Did I miss something I should have caught?
• Am I the leader I’ve told myself I am, or just an impostor who’s been lucky until now?

That doubt doesn’t stay at work. It follows me. Into my bed. Into the conversations I should be having with Clare and the boys, our lifestyle choices. Into the quiet moments when I should be resting but instead feel like I’m suffocating under the weight of “what ifs.”

Because leadership isn’t just about what happens on site. It bleeds into your family, your finances, your future. For me, losing my role doesn’t just mean starting over. It means Clare going back to work, the boys going back to school, and me scrambling to hold everything together for my parents, who sold their home to move onto our property. It means the house build stops, maybe permanently. It means reshaping our whole life.

That weight is crushing. And it leaves you asking yourself: why would anyone choose to lead, if this is the price of getting it wrong?

Why We Step Up Anyway

Here’s the truth: failure is part of leadership. Always has been. Always will be.

Every leader in history, whether it was a tribal elder guiding a small clan, a general commanding armies, or a parent holding a family together, has stood where I stand now. Making decisions with incomplete information. Acting in the fog of uncertainty. Getting it wrong. And wearing the weight of that failure.

The reality is we make many, many more great decisions and take risks that pay off. No-one remembers those… you’ve heard the joke: “but you f#$k one goat!” You get my point.

But here’s the thing...without those decisions, without those risks, without those failures, we don’t move forward.

• Every tool we’ve invented came after failures of the last one.
• Every discovery was built on mistakes that nearly broke the people making them.
• Every society that has ever thrived was forged by leaders willing to risk being wrong so their people could move forward.
• Every great leader has grown from failures in their past.

Failure isn’t the opposite of leadership. It’s the cost of it.

When we step up to lead, we don’t just accept the chance of success....we accept the guarantee of failure at some point. We accept that the people watching us will see our mistakes, will question our judgment, and sometimes will suffer for our decisions.

And still, we step up. Because the alternative is paralysis. And nothing grows in paralysis.

The Fire We Walk Into

I’ve always been someone who runs into the fire. I don’t shy away from fear, even when I know it’s going to burn. And last night, I was afraid.

Afraid of failing my family. Afraid of failing myself. Afraid of not being enough to carry the mantle I’ve chosen.

But when I look back at history...at our story as human beings....I realise fear has always been part of it. Our ancestors didn’t move out of caves, cross oceans, or launch into space because they were certain. They did it because someone was willing to take a step into the unknown, knowing full well they might fail.

That’s what leadership is: stepping forward, afraid and uncertain, because if you don’t, who else will?

Running an industrial plant isn’t the same as climbing into a rocket on a wing and a prayer. The potential outcomes are different. But stress is relative. What matters is the weight you carry, and the fear of what could be lost.

A Reflection for Those Carrying the Weight

If you’re reading this and you carry responsibility....for a business, a team, or a family....you already know what I’m talking about. You know the sleepless nights. You know the fear of letting people down. You know the crushing weight of doubt.

But here’s what I’m reminding myself right now:

• Failure doesn’t disqualify you from leadership. It proves you’re in the fight.
• Doubt doesn’t make you weak. It makes you human.
• The weight won’t crush you if you let it shape you.
• Fear is as much a motivator as it is a sharpening stone for the mind.

Leadership has never been about perfection. It’s about courage. The courage to make decisions in the fog. The courage to own them when they go wrong. The courage to stand up again, not because it’s easy, but because the people you’re leading need you to.

I don’t know what changes will come in the future, what roles I’ll move into, or what failures I’ll meet again. But responsibility doesn’t vanish. It just takes new form. Because in the end, leadership isn’t a job. It’s a choice. A mantle. A fire you walk into.

And when the fear rises....as it always will....maybe the most honest thing any leader can say is this:

I’m scared. I’ve failed. And I’m still here standing, ready to keep going.