Years ago, as a CIO, I got a wake-up call that one of the business functions was extremely dissatisfied with the service from my organization. I accepted perception as reality and asked the function head to assign the most vocal critic to work with me in improving the situation. Because I treated this as one of my personal priorities, we won back the hearts and minds of our business partners and implemented governance mechanisms that are now common practice in most organizations today.

Leverage events. The good thing about bad news is that everyone involved is highly motivated to change. Roger is in a wonderful position to implement changes that are way overdue — specifically, a refinement of the order fulfilment process supported by changes in technology and systems ownership. His business counterparts aren't buying the changes as of yet, so he is working with the plant managers to initiate some proof of concepts to further bolster his case.

One cautionary note: Make sure that the changes you are proposing relate to the issues at hand. For instance, it is helpful to get the counsel of others to help you choose your battles when planning your remediation. Roger was tempted to throw some budgeting changes into the mix until he was counselled that, by doing so, he was at risk of losing support because he was asking for too much.

Organizations can weather the occasional storm and expect that, in the process of making mistakes, their leaders will learn from experience. Many executives have used setbacks to improve their relationships, credibility and, ultimately, the performance of their organizations. The only bad mistake is one that is made repeatedly, without accountability. The rest are painful, often messy, but rarely fatal.

Susan Cramm is founder and president of Valuedance, an executive coaching firm in San Clemente, California. You can e-mail feedback to susan@valuedance.com.