If you must miss, do it perfectly
Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor - Truman Capote
Most of us treat performance toward goals as a binary outcome. Someone either hits or they don't. This is an oversimplification and can cause a misplacement of coaching or celebration.
At the end of a performance cycle, there are really four potential outcomes (not two): 1) system-hit, 2) lucky-hit, 3) system-miss, and 4) perfect-miss.
System-hit: Things were done correctly. The top of the funnel was consistently filled, deals moved stages at appropriate ratios, and discovery, qualification, and objection handling were all on point. This is a deserved win.
Lucky-hit: This one is more complicated. The pipeline might be a mess, and customer experience could be in the toilet, but there is one massive deal that comes in, or back-to-back high intent inbounds that don't require selling. This is a loss, masquerading as a win.
System-miss: This has all the properties of the lucky hit, however, we are not so fortunate to have the pipeline whale. This is a loss, that looks like a loss.
Perfect-miss: Things were done correctly. Process, pitch, and attitude were above board on all fronts. Unfortunately, we fall on the wrong side of circumstance and for whatever reason don't hit. This is a win, masquerading as a loss.
Earlier in my career, I made the biggest mistakes coaching after the perfect-miss. I would come up with plans and ghost-feedback that didn’t make much sense, because in actuality the process and pitch didn’t need any alteration, the person just needed the encouragement to repeat the same thing over again, knowing that performance should shake out statistically. Sales lightning can and will strike, but rarely 2, 3, or 4 times in a row.
If I could go back and give myself feedback in these moments, it would be to normalize this statement. “Being unlucky sucks, but unfortunately it happens. You did great, and you are excellent at this job, regardless of what the dashboard reflects. Go out and do exactly what you did again”
Celebrate the perfect miss.