Culture Hack: The “Fail Wheel”

Elizabeth Bailey Weil
2 min readNov 3, 2021

by Elizabeth Weil, Managing Partner, Scribble VC

This is #6 of 8 “flash content drops” in collaboration with MOMA artist & entrepreneur Paul Budnitz (CEO, Superplastic). We cover The 3 Types of Intelligence, the Future of NFTs, the “Creator Brain”, and How to Stoke Risk-Taking. You can follow me on twitter to get them.

(p.s. SUPERPLASTIC IS HIRING! If you want to join a rocketship or know someone who should, Superplastic is hiring a Director of Marketing, a Marketing Manager, and a Paid Media Specialist.)

“It’s a false dichotomy to say “fail fast”, but then not do something to train everyone’s brain that failing is a positive.” — Paul Budnitz, Founder & CEO, Superplastic

  • I have this wheel. And if you screw up and you admit that you screwed up, you’re not allowed to make any excuses.
  • You have to take full responsibility. You have to say you screwed up and then you have to apologize for it to everybody.
  • If you do all those things with great cheer, you get an awesome prize.
  • We do it all the time. And I spin it all the time because I screw up more than anyone else.
  • I encourage people to take responsibility for f**k ups they didn’t even make, too.
  • It’s a false dichotomy to say “fail fast”, but then not do something to train everyone’s brain that this is a positive.
  • Culture is not what you say. It is what you do.
  • So ask yourself — what are you **doing** (not just saying) to celebrate failure in your startup?

Stay Tuned → Coming up at 7am tomorrow — Consensus vs. Democracy in Companies (2 min read). Follow Elizabeth on Twitter to get this content drop.

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Elizabeth Bailey Weil

Founder and GP @ Scribble (scribble.vc). Prev. a16z, Twitter. Investor: SpaceX, Slack, Coinbase, Figma, Clubhouse, Calm, Grab. & more. Mom of 3. Ultra-runner.