Great leaders are capable of learning from their mistakes. Please describe a professional or personal failure you have experienced.
Yes, I did make my blunders in South Africa.
The problem was that I did not think quality was crucial in a market like South Africa's. Acting upon my suggestion, my company once sent in quite some products that were substandard in quality but priced accordingly. I thought that was fair enough, since large numbers of South Africans could probably afford only such products.
But we soon found that we were woefully mistaken. Although poor black South Africans make up the majority of the country's population, 80 to 90 per cent of the country's purchasing power was concentrated into the hands of the privileged white community, in which the demand for quality is as rigid as any other western country. The poor-quality products we had had to be stockpiled for a long time, resulted in considerable losses to the company.
That loss drove home the importance of careful market research, which simply cannot be replaced all with business hunch, no matter how sophisticated one is. I took responsibility for the blunder. I have since attached the utmost importance to quality, and that has not only turned things around quickly but also ensured my company's continuous expansion.
