How to Own Mistakes at Work—While Staying True to Your Personality

Most people take pride in the quality of their work. Having the respect of your employers, managers, supervisors and co-workers validates you and makes you feel like you’re earning your position.

But no matter your diligence and level of professionalism, at some time or another you’re bound to make an error, something serious enough to have real-world consequences that make you feel bad and cause problems for everyone.

In this situation, honesty is the best policy. You simply won’t be able to hide the truth—or hide from the truth—because the costs of doing so would be too high. Owning up to your mistake and doing your best to fix it is the best way to maintain relationships and preserve your reputation.

While some people are good at throwing their hands in the air and saying, "My bad!" without feeling too much anxiety or guilt, others seek to quietly minimize their role in the mistake and fear being judged too harshly. The key to owning your mistakes is to do it in a way that feels honest and authentic to your personality.

In this article, we're using the DISC personality testing system to help you customize how you own up to your mistakes at work. Here are some mistake-owning tips for each of the four DISC personality styles: Drive, Influence, Support and Clarity.

Drive: Be forthright about your mistakes

Before you can own your mistakes you have to be willing to admit that you’ve actually made them. Of the four DISC types, this is hardest for people who are motivated by Drive.

Drive types are self-confident, self-assured, and quick to notice the missteps of others (to their credit, they often try to be helpful rather than judgmental). But when the shoe is on the other foot, a Drive person will worry about losing face, prestige or control, which can make it hard for them to admit they’ve bungled. Drive people are competitive with co-workers and with themselves, and, to them, mistakes can seem like appalling and embarrassing failures.

What to do: Push through your pride and discomfort and proactively discuss what happened with your managers and co-workers. You are forthright by nature – being equally forthright about your mistakes and intentions to fix them, with no rationalization or sugar-coating, will demonstrate your integrity.

Influence: Stay upbeat and lean on the group

As an Influence person, you are at your best working collaboratively in teams. You’re excellent at inspiring others to trust their instincts, believe in themselves and ultimately perform at their highest level. You love to help your teammates arrive at a collective solution that works extraordinarily well for everyone, and for the business as a whole.

But owning up to a big mistake will flip the script. When you talk to your employers and fellow employees about your error and its consequences, you’ll have to stand in front of them all on your own, accepting the failure as yours exclusively. And that can make you feel vulnerable and exposed in a way that’s hard to face.

What to do: Stay optimistic as you explain what happened. You’ll make the best impression if you conduct yourself as you normally would, with a sunny and encouraging disposition. With a bit of luck, your teammates will remember all the ways you've helped them in the past and respond by offering to help you in your hour of need. If they do, then accept their assistance without hesitation – you work best in groups and collaboration will help you do the best possible job cleaning up the mess you made.

Support: Own your mistakes with a steady hand

Support types feel guilty when they make mistakes. They feel certain that they’ve let their customers or teammates down, and they worry that nothing will make up for their gigantic blunder.

If you’re a Support person, your conscientiousness and sense of responsibility are among your greatest assets. You’ll feel an urgent need to stand up and admit to your mistakes and take action as quickly as possible to address them. You should resist the temptation to be overly contrite and apologetic, however. If you overreact and beat yourself up too much, it can set a bad example for your co-workers, who may come to see their occasional mistakes as bigger tragedies than they actually are.

What to do: You have an innate ability to stay patient and focused in the face of adversity so lean into those skills. Stay calm and even-keeled as you make your apology, showing tolerance toward yourself just as you would toward anyone else. After all, you're only human – mistakes are bound to happen from time to time. As a Support type, you'll preserve your dignity and self-respect if you model these qualities, even as you take full responsibility for your mistake.

Clarity: Analyze mistakes without dwelling on them

For Clarity types, it isn’t nearly enough to admit that they made a mistake. They want to understand exactly why they failed so they can ensure it won’t happen again. And your search for answers as a Clarity person will not be cursory or brief – you'll go over things moment by moment, carefully dissecting your thinking and your actions, to see how you got off-track.

After admitting to your mistake, you must develop a comprehensive plan to address its consequences in their entirety. This is essential for your mental and emotional well-being since you won’t be comfortable with a partial solution. The risk is that you’ll become overly analytical and spend too much time reflecting on what went wrong. That can prevent you from looking ahead to the future and moving on with your life.

What to do: For you, owning a mistake could involve a rather extensive process. And that's okay – speaking honestly and in detail about what went wrong, and listening to what others have to say about it, will help you get the answers you need. You feel confident knowing that you’ve thought of every last detail, and this will preserve your reputation as someone who never backs down from a challenge or misses an opportunity to improve their performance. Just don't go overboard with the analysis – try to keep some perspective and be ready to move on when you've done all that needs to be done.