TOEFL independent writing test 5 with sample essay

Do you agree or disagree with the following idea:

To be successful in business, people have to accept initial failures.


Use specific reasons and examples for your answer.

Sample essay


Our life is not simple; there are many dangers and challenges that cause failures to us. When we start something new, there are a lot of problems in so much as we do not know these ones well. Although, we want to avoid failing, it may come to us any time. We certainly do our best but if failures come, I think it is not too bad. I mean failures teach us valuable lessons; failures not only help us to have a stronger will, but they also provide us with experiences. This leads us to be successful in business.


To begin with, failures give us a will of iron. When we fail initially, we obviously become terribly hopeless and upset. Also, we may not want to do anything else, because we fear that we collapse again. These things happen naturally, but after that we feel that there is no reason why we keep being sad and doing nothing. Moreover, there are a lot of people supporting and encouraging us so we decide to try again to not let them down. After recovering from sorrows, we are determined to retry our business and make it perfect more than ever. In addition, we are ready for challenges that may come to us. Despite many difficulties, we are not afraid of failures like before. We may even take more risks, even if these risks can lead us to a breakdown again. The more risks we take, the more opportunities we have to be successful. That we do not accept initial failures means we fail. I mean that not accepting initial failures is really a big failure. For example, Thomas Edison, who is a famous inventor, had carried out thousands of experiments before he completed his electric bulb. It is observed that Edison went on experimenting until he succeeded in his doing. He was extremely determined.


Secondly, failures teach us skills to deal with difficulties. After having failed, we realize a lot of things; we figure out why we did not succeed. In this way, we can draw the lessons to learn. If we continue to do the same thing in the same way, we will never fail. As a result, we will never learn new thing. And when an unusual incident comes, we do not know how to solve it. Once we have experienced failures, we know what to do when troubles come. It results from the skills, tips and techniques we learned from the previous failure. For instance, when we start a restaurant, we wish the restaurant can attract a lot of people. However, in fact, there are few people who come there to eat. We have to find out what the problem is. Maybe, the dishes are not delicious or the promoting campaign is not proper. Finally, we discover not many people know our restaurant. To solve this issue, we rent some people to give out leaflets at crossroads so that much more people know and come to the restaurant to enjoy delicious food. And that is where the learning comes in.


In conclusion, before succeeding, we should experience failures which bring us profoundly valuable lessons. When failure comes, we should face it and draw what we can learn from it other than do nothing.