Failing Forward
By: Drew Hairston
Allegheny Football Coach, Matt Hanhold
Ryan Leak’s Chasing Failure explores the scientific reasoning behind avoiding failure and offers steps to actually embrace it. Leak says that everyone fails in life, but being able to learn, grow, and improve because of these failures will put you on the path to success. Matt Hanhold defines this willingness to learn from failure as failing forward. In his coaching career, he has had many setbacks and failures that made him question and pause his path to success. However, he continued and failed forward in the same way that Leak describes chasing failure to improve and grow.
“This past season at the Juniata game, I did not feel well all day. I felt like I was gonna pass out. That week, I was told that my dad had 3 months left to live. It felt like I was having a panic attack or something in the middle of the game. We still had time to win, but I did not put us in the best position. I failed us.
My first year as part of Coach Layer’s football staff at Allegheny, we performed very well, and I thought this would be the status quo. The second year, we did not have a great season, and I realized that we had to change again. We had to continue to develop and progress forward. This was part of failing forward.
When you fail forward, you learn something. You take failure as a positive for growth and development. 17 years of coaching felt invisible, and I had heard that you aren’t a true coach until you get fired. That was a really bold statement. A football coach is a results-oriented professional, and we had a really bad year at my old school. After this season, I ran the program as a head coach until the rug got pulled out from under me. I was misled, and I had 90 days until my contract was up. I needed to find another job.
Nothing was sticking when looking for jobs, until the old head coach at Allegheny offered me the position of D-Line Coach/Special Teams Coordinator. This was a step down from my previous roles and a $50,000 pay cut. I lived in one of the worst one-bedrooms in Meadville, where my bike got stolen from my back porch.
After 6 months, the head coach left Allegheny. I thought, “Here we go again.” Coach Layer came in and let me do what I did before as a defensive coordinator. I had learned from my mistakes, made corrections, and failed forward.
I’ve been in extreme ups and downs and seen all sides of the spectrum. I’m fortunate for that. When things are going bad, I’m motivated by the people around me to bridge the gap of what’s going to keep me going. You can either be a miserable fuck, or you can be the same person that you are. I’m always failing, but the question is, how do you fail forward?”