Opinion: Learning From Tech Failures, If We Choose

In today’s world of mainstream- and social-media hype — around the latest AI tools, wildly successful corporate mergers, spectacular space launches, a last second game-winning field goal, or an investor becoming a millionaire through cryptocurrency — it can be hard enough to get your successes recognized. Much less in the field of technology in higher education. But in our desire for public acknowledgement, we should also recognize the important lessons we have to share and learn from our failures. Let me explain how failures can help us achieve our future successes and learn about ourselves, the importance of perseverance, and how our institutions can become more resilient. 

LESSONS FROM SAMUEL SMILES

If we look back to the Victorian era in the 1850s, the Industrial Revolution was driving significant achievements and advancements in industry and communications. This led to the development and growth of railways, steamships and the telegraph. Impressive mass production, increasingly faster transportation and unprecedented long-distance communications became hallmarks of the time. This sounds quite familiar today, with different dynamics and technologies at work. During this period, a Scottish-trained physician, governmental reformer and later prolific author, Samuel Smiles, began promoting his idea of “Self-Help” in a book he wrote in 1859. He firmly believed all men and women were responsible for their own personal successes and failures. The online research platform EBSCO Information Services documents that, “Despite facing criticism from some literary circles, Smiles is recognized as a significant chronicler of the transformative effects of technology during the Victorian era. He also wrote extensively on topics such as thrift, duty, and moral character.” In his writings, Smiles is quoted as saying, “We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success.” Quite possibly, this self-help concept and the idea of learning from our failures, which Smiles wrote nearly 170 years ago, is still relevant today.

WHY ED TECH FAILS

Over the years, innovative technologies have been poised to transform the educational process, to make it more immersive, interactive and customized for specific teaching and learning styles. In many situations, educational technology coupled with IT tools has made impressive strides in our ability to successfully instruct students. However, there may have been a fair number of failures along the way. The question is, why do technology failures occur, and what can we learn from these experiences?

Some of the common reasons I’ve seen technology failures occur include insufficient training of the faculty and students, a technology was selected primarily based on cost efficiency rather than true effectiveness, or the technology did not sufficiently align with what the instructor actually teaches. As University of Texas at Austin history professor Steven Mintz pointed out in his column "Why Most Ed Tech Fails" for Inside Higher Ed in 2021, while the “history of educational technology is littered with failure … technology can transform learning into a more active process.”

IT FAILURES IN HIGHER ED

Failures in higher education technology, whether by malfunction or simple user error, can provide important clues and lessons that lead to better planning and communications in building critical infrastructure, systems, processes and policy. For example, as a CIO, I would frequently use the automated email marketing platform Mailchimp to create and disseminate graphically rich email communications that could track open and read rates. Interestingly, the average email open rate for faculty was typically below 40 percent, while the average open rate for students was around 45 percent. One could count this a failure, as it translated into over half of both audiences not opening their IT-related email. These open rates increased during campuswide technology changes or cybersecurity updates, but they illustrated for me the importance of multiple communication alternatives to keep my IT customers up to date.

IT failures in higher education can teach us crucial lessons about the need for better planning, the importance of building resilient systems, and the necessity of encouraging a culture that can learn from failures and setbacks. Failures can draw attention to issues such as poor project planning and management, ineffective data security, a lack of contingencies and recovery, and the risk of complex customization with legacy technology.

UNIVERSAL LESSONS LEARNED FROM FAILURE

There is hope in learning from failures and developing processes to avoid them in the future. When a technology failure occurs, it’s always important to conduct a post-mortem analysis to identify its root cause. We should also share our failures with others and document how we corrected the situation. This can be an important “lessons learned” document for you, your team and other internal and external audiences. And don’t be afraid to ask for assistance and guidance from others.

In its list of the top 10 IT issues for 2026, the nonprofit EDUCAUSE listed collaborative cybersecurity, the human edge of AI, measured approaches to modern technology, and technology literacy. These and others on the list could all be served by examining and understanding our failures, and taking opportunities to learn rather than merely trying to avoid embarrassment. I worked with a CIO once who would always say, “We should celebrate our failures.” When I first heard that, I wasn’t sure the teams could embrace the concept. But in reality, celebrating your failures is a profound way to conquer your initial fear of failure, to learn from it, and to share your resolution and future planning to avoid repeating the same mistake twice. The technology we utilize today has come a long way from the era Samuel Smiles wrote about, but the same principle applies: “He who never made a mistake, never made a discovery." Go forward, make your mistakes, and choose to learn from them.