You made a big mistake at work. How do you bounce back?

You made your first mistake at work – and it feels terrible. Maybe you messed up on an important project or failed to meet the expectations set for you. In your first two years, these mistakes can feel devastating. You don’t have years of experience to fall back on and it can feel like you’ll forever be defined by this mistake at the workplace. 

The next few months can feel like an extended interview where everyone overanalyzes your subsequent moves. The pressure to regain the lost trust and prove yourself is high. How do you truly own up to your mistakes beyond just saying sorry? What are the concrete ways in which you can recover from this mistake? How do you earn the trust of your peers? 

Host Akshaya Chandrasekaran talks to experts who’ve truly mastered the art and science of bouncing back from a mistake. On this episode, you’ll hear accounts of crises and turnaround and pragmatic ways to mend the tricky situation at hand. 

This season of the podcast is all about the firsts one might encounter in the world of work. This is the fifth episode in the lineup, let us know what you think? 

You can write to Akshaya, the host, at [email protected]. 

If you have a career question you want us to cover? Tell us. 

This episode was written and hosted by Akshaya Chandrasekaran, and produced by Anushka Mukherjee, with audio engineering by Rajiv CN. 

The First Two Years is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. 

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