Failing Forward

The most useful conversations in our sector are the ones we don't have enough of — the ones where someone puts up their hand and says, that didn't go the way we planned. Here's what we wish we'd known.

Together with Data Friendly Space, GOAL Innovation Lab brought together four practitioners to talk honestly about the projects that hit walls, the tools that didn't land the way we expected, and how as a sector we move forward from here.

From an iron fish that field data showed wasn't needed, to AI speech recognition that worked perfectly in the lab but broke in the field, to 20 years of evaluation recommendations that still haven't changed — this session didn't pull punches.

This is the first in an ongoing series. If something resonated with you, or if you're ready to share your own failure story, we'd love to hear from you.