If you are involved in something that goes wrong, never blame other. Blame no one but yourself.

If you have touched something, accept total responsibility for that piece of work. If you accept responsibility, you are in a position to do something about it.

Here are some common excuses for failures:

- It was a terrible brief.

- I need a better partner.

- There wasn’t enough money to do it properly.

- The director didn’t listen to me.

- I was too busy on other projects.

- I wasn’t given enough time.

- The client took out the best ideas.

Most of these grievances are everyday on every job. That won’t change.

The point is that, whatever other people are failings might be, you are the one to shoulder the responsibility.

The person who doesn’t make mistakes is unlikely to make anything.

Benjamin Franklin said, ‘I haven’t failed, I’ve had 10,000 ideas that didn’t work.’

Thomas Edison said, ‘Of the 200 light bulbs that didn’t work, every failure told me something that I was able to incorporate into the next attempt.’

Theatre director Joan Littlewood said, ‘If we don’t get lost, we’ll never find a new route.’

All of them understood that failures and false starts are a precondition of success.