Michael Jordan
& the Power of Missing
Leadership is the courage to keep taking the shot. Failure doesn’t define leaders — persistence does.
Before becoming a global icon, Michael Jordan was a teenager with a crushing disappointment: he was cut from his high-school basketball team. He wasn’t tall enough, strong enough, or polished enough to make the varsity lineup. Most players would have given up. Jordan didn’t. He spent that summer practicing alone in his driveway — jump shot after jump shot — visualizing success, replaying every miss in his mind until it became fuel.
Years later, as a professional, he still missed — a lot.
He missed over 9,000 shots, lost nearly 300 games, and failed 26 times to make the game-winning basket. Yet when the game was on the line, he always wanted the ball.
Why? Because leadership isn’t about avoiding mistakes. It’s about embracing them. Jordan turned failure into discipline, disappointment into focus, and defeat into leadership. His teammates didn’t just follow him because he scored points — they followed him because he took responsibility, inspired confidence, and made everyone around him better.
He once said, “I can accept failure — everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.”
That mindset built a legacy that still defines excellence today.
The lesson endures: true leadership is not about perfection — it’s about the courage to act, the humility to learn, and the persistence to keep showing up when it matters most.
