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Fail Test

Definition

A decision-making method that defines what absolute failure looks like for a given test or milestone — rather than defining success. If the outcome clears the fail threshold, proceed; if it doesn't, the answer is clear. The approach counteracts the human tendency to focus on a few bright spots while ignoring an overall poor result.

Origin

Introduced by Karl Rectanus in Ep. 1: Decoding the EdTech Founder. Karl describes it through a golf analogy: a golfer who shoots a 104 will leave the course remembering only the two or three pure shots — the drive down the middle, the beautiful putt — rather than the overall poor result. Setting a fail test — rather than a success test — forces honest evaluation of overall outcomes.

Application

Karl applied the fail test at LearnPlatform's founding in 2014. After nearly a year of due diligence trying to find an existing organization to pursue the ed tech data opportunity, Karl set a concrete fail test: attend the ASU GSV conference and attempt to raise $250,000 in seed funding. If the fail test wasn't cleared, he would not start the company. The result: $350,000 in early investment from Kaplan, Techstars, and others. Karl told his wife, "I'm sorry, I think we're going to have to start this company if we're okay with it. We failed at failing the test."