Why is everyone so afraid of real risk?

A sad fact of life in many organizations today is that we have never moved far from the "Man in the Gray Flannel Suit," the classic novel and movie from the 1950's. Organizations pay a lot of lip service to "thinking out of the box," and "paradigm shifting." Sadly, these are nothing more than feel good, happy thoughts so that we feel we are doing something when in most cases the opposite is true.

Many organizations fear change like a child in a haunted house. They see change as an unknown and worse of all it may be something they can not manage. A number of organizations subscribe to the religion of six sigma or what ever business philosophy is in fashion and then drink the Kool Aid until the next philosophy over comes it. Sadly, this encourages only short term thinking and doesn't require a true examination of whether or not there are long term objectives we should be setting as goals and trying to achieve.

I have witnessed myself organizations who follow the path of least resistance and then reward this underachievement by saying," oh you have done a great job of meeting a meaningless goal, thank you for not calling to our attention that our reward system is based on not taking any risk what so ever." Look at history everyone! What was accomplished without taking some risk? Do you think Columbus set sail for the new world without tremendous risk? What about Apollo 11? How about any company when they started from Ford up to Amazon? Risk is good and should be embraced and risk aversion should not be punished.

Sadly, we are living in a world where the word risk is being treated as a bad word. Our current economic situation was not caused by risk. It was caused by greed and stupidity. Part of risk is realizing that there is a moment to pull back. Risk is calculating what you need to reach the mountain top and what needs to be done right. Stupidity, and its cousin arrogance, is climbing the mountain without being prepared or educated about what the downside may be out there. Laziness is climbing a hill one-tenth the height of the hill.

So risk is not our enemy. Our enemy is stupidity, it is laziness it is a system that rewards stale and old ideas and doesn't allow for any innovation for fear something may possibly go wrong. Take a risk in life. The benefits of risk, when taken properly, far outweigh the potential for harm.

Now the second half starts for the Red Sox today! I remember when if the Sox were in first at the All-Star break we would be dying. Not any more. I can't wait!