Here is another valuable Management Tip of the Day from Harvard Business Review. To sign up for a free subscription to any/all HBR newsletters, please click here.

Everyone reacts differently to failure: some immediately accuse others while some take the heat themselves, even if undeserved.

Next time you and your team fail, resist the temptation to place blame. Take these three steps instead:

1. Think before you act. Don’t respond immediately or impulsively. Doing so can make matters worse. Take the time to consider several possible interpretations of the event and how you might react.

2. Listen and communicate. Never assume you know what others think. Gather feedback and then explain your own actions and intentions.

3. Search for a lesson. Mistakes happen. It may be that you’re to blame, someone else is, or no one is. Create and test hypotheses about how and why the failure happened to prevent it from happening again.

Today’s Management Tip was adapted from “Managing Yourself: Can You Handle Failure?” by Ben Dattner and Robert Hogan.

To read that article and join the discussion, please click here.