GETTING STARTED
“The hardest thing about getting started, is getting started” (1)
Risks & Ventures is a blog and commentary conceived around the theme of managing risk. It was founded by a small group of professionals working in diverse risk and venture-related fields who had some ideas which we felt we wanted to share a bit more widely.
Why Risk Management?
Risk management means a lot of different things to different people, and we understand that sometimes there are some negative perceptions about it as a discipline: it is boring, it is highly quantitative, it is time-consuming, it is really about is trying to limit or restrict businesses and individuals from doing things they want to do, and in this way not really adding value.
We disagree with these ideas, both at an individual and organizational level. We think smart risk management absolutely adds value to businesses in all sorts of ways, and that practical risk management can really help us reach our goals as individuals too.
Every time we do something or choose not to do something, we are doing a form of risk management.
When we get up we check the weather to see what clothes we should wear that day. This is risk management.
It’s also risk management when we choose to buy something and we weight up the pros and cons associated with owning or consuming that item.
And if we are tired and go to bed early we are trying to reduce the threats of tiredness and poor performance the next day and enhance all the opportunities that go along with feeling awake and lively.
Life is about risk management and risk management is about life
So although we only tend to really think about it in a structured way when we are making big life decisions like changing jobs or moving houses, we are actually doing risk management all the time. Life in this sense is all about risk management and so risk management is also all about the way we live.
It’s about finding ways to achieve your objectives, not just setting limitations. Achieving the things you want to do as individuals and organizations, but just maybe doing it in ways that are a bit smarter, more efficiently and effectively.
Risks & Ventures is going to be about living life. Looking for pathways, analysing opportunities, seeing how other people made it, trying to avoid bad stuff and trying to get more of the stuff that we do want out of life.
And who wouldn’t be interested in learning more about that?
We’re going to get Risks & Ventures going by picking a few key themes which we think are interesting and developing content around them. We hope that content is going to be good enough to make you want to come back and read more, and we hope to grow and learn ourselves as we are doing this too.
This said, in the spirit of Jawed Karim’s trip to the zoo let’s get going.
(1) Guy Kawasaki, The Art of the Start, Penguin, 2004:10