By Peter Cochrane, 16 October 2006 11:15
COMMENT
Written at Copenhagen Airport after an easy check-in and relaxed period in the airport lounge. Completed a couple of weeks later at Paradise Bay, Mamaris, Turkey and despatched to silicon.com from a free wi-fi site in Bozburun.
Everywhere I go people and organisations seem obsessed with risk-analysis and assessment. They seem to dedicate huge resources trying to anticipate what might go wrong and the follow-on consequences.
Often it appears, on the face of it anyway, that the analysis process has an overall cost that rivals the subject matter and all associated risk potential. Worst of all, the potential risks identified - no matter how small and unlikely - may be used as an excuse for inaction and/or indecision. To my mind it just doesn't seem to be right in a world so rich in opportunity!
So my question is: where are all the people doing the opportunity analysis? And where are those concerned with the opportunity/risk ratio?
We hear a lot about the supposed risks from mobile phones but nothing about the benefits. Similarly for GM crops, centralised power generation, nuclear instrumentation and numerous medications and medical treatments. All the emphasis seems to be placed on the side of insignificant risks to the detriment of huge gains that are subsequently lost.
What has gone wrong? Is it the media's love of the pessimistic disaster scenario and the 'you're all going to die' message? Or is it the risk of litigation? The influence of politics? Or has society become so simple-minded that it is no longer able to balance risk and opportunity, cost and benefit? Perhaps it is a combination of all of these and every detrimental aspect of modern education!
You would think that with the advance of IT and networks that we would have become collectively smarter across the board but in some areas it seems not to be the case. Among the decision makers, smartness seems to be increasingly selective and limited. Whilst the professions and individual groups have benefited enormously from the 'e-revolution', society as a whole may indeed have become relatively dumber compared to the overall uplift engendered.
Searching the web I have found plenty of sites relating risk - or opportunity - with cost and benefit but nothing that gives a comprehensive compendium of common cases with figures couched in a way that is easy to digest and understand. In fact, there seems to be many more sites devoted to bemoaning the fact that society has a very poor understanding of risk than those trying to address or fix the problem.
It is difficult to comprehend the decisions of parents who put their children at great risk on the basis of a scare story in the press such as the MMR vaccine, which was based upon pretty shaky evidence, and more especially when the downside risk is so great. On a statistical basis there is little doubt that their decisions will see some serious casualties and a lot of heartache. This type of situation is also reflected in government and industry where overreaction to the insignificant seems to have become the dominant mode.
Perhaps then there is an opportunity here for a website or general tool-set that points out the most commonly reported and feared risks, relative to, say, crossing the road. And then goes on to assess risk in a way and language we can all understand and enjoy.
A scare story that says the risk of thrombosis increases three-fold with the contraceptive pill does a great disservice to everyone by not explaining that a risk increase from (approximately) one in 50,000 to three in 50,000 really is a 'zip risk change' and presents no extra risk at all compared to pregnancy and child birth!
In our schools the significant skill-building classes on woodwork, metalwork, technology and science where students would learn to safely use a forge, pillar drill, lathe, milling machine, welding torch, soldering iron and many more 'lethal instruments' have been replaced by 'Mickey Mouse' classes that only involve things that are safe.
An unintended consequence is that our (now) ignorant 18-year-old students go to the tool store and buy everything they wish. Shortly afterwards they finish up in the local hospital casualty unit with cuts, burns and worse that could have been avoided if only they had been educated in the use of tools and safe working practices.
The tragedy is we are creating one generation after another which are more and more disconnected from real risks. It has simply been removed from their lives by over-protective institutions throughout their formative years and beyond.
What was an everyday experience for my generation has now become an adventure. People drive cars, cross the road, engage in sporting activities every day and they generally assess the risks correctly on the fly. If only we could get them to do it sensibly and responsibly in other aspects of their home and working lives, both on and off the screen.
Comments
There are 8 comments. Join the discussion
1. Eric the Disillusioned
Nice one Peter. I'm fed up of being told we can't do something (like win business or have fun) because it's too risky. So what if it is. Personally I'd sign any waiver you like to be allowed to have the fun I want out of my life. Moreover, I feel that removing the capacity to take limited but genuine risks at work removes the experience and education required to generate real management candidates - instead management becomes a club in such companies where shoulder patting and 'black-balling' replace genuine capability.
Reduce the HSE to a tenth of its size, tell RoSPA that they are a society and not a watchdog or policeman, and tell the media to tone it down or we'll up their risks of going out of business.
2. anonymous
Once again I have to agree entirely with Peter Cochrane's assessment of a few generations that have become progressively risk averse.
Unfortunately it also has a number of side effects, but I think the one that is most apparent is the loss of joy in working.
If there is no risk the workplace becomes sterile and this is born out not only by the lack of will to succeed in any half-risky enterprise, but by stupid laws that make the whole workplace atmosphere dominated by political correctness, such as the sexual and age related harrassment laws which now makes joking in any form subject to a risk of being taken to court for a harmless bit of fun. Of course there are those who do sexually harrass the opposite sex, but the vast majority of incidents are not intended to have that effect and now with the ageism law this will be another reason for not taking the risk of having any harmless fun in the workplace. The larger the organisation the greater the potential risk, so everyone will keep their head below the parapet and the workplace will become somewhere that every one hates going to and more home workers will be born, but maybe that will be a positive side to the otherwise negative story of 'evolution' in the workplace.
3. anonymous
Peter, well done!
You've said what I've been thinking for years, which is that our children are now brought up in such a sanitised environment that they no longer have the ability to recognise danger when it stares them in the face.
Occasionally I see films on TV of school childre in (I assume) chemistry lessons, with huge safety goggles and lab coats. When I did "A" level chemistry over 40 years ago we wore lab coats, but nothing else, we were smart enough to anticipate the dangers of boiling liquids.
is this the reason that there is so much delinquency - there is no danger allowed any more, and all the fun has gone out of life in consequence.
My wife is a primary school teacher and she feels that school outings are about to become a thing of the past because of all the hassle of doing a risk assessment before the kids step outside the classroom!
4. Simon
Well said !
I'll add that I'm just totally p***ed off with the number of things done (or more usually prohibited) in the name of "health & safety regulations" - my favourite being the pernitious spread of hi-vis jackets to places/situations for no other reason than someone is covering their backside and can't be bothered to actually think about it.
Even a senior Health & Safety Commision person was recently quoted as saying that people using rules to stop things being done should "get a life and let others get on with theirs" - it was so refreshing to hear such commonsense words !
One of my favourite anecdotes about hi-vis jackets was from a pilot friend of mine flying from a small rural airfield. He was checking round his plane when someone waved a phone at him from the clubhouse - it was the control tower asking why he wasn't wearing a hi-vis jacket. He repsponded with "how do you knwo that I'm not wearing one ?" Predicatably they replied with "We can see you" - from half a mile away ! He just said "Well if you can see me then I don't need one" and put the phone down on them.
5. Eric (somehat hopeful)
Excellent piece of risk assessment, Peter. Risk assessment, if taken to the nth degree can paralize society. It depends on who is doing it. If the assessor doesn't fully understand what it is all about or feels that as an assessor he/she must find something, we end up with incredibly stupid decisions, such as the packet of peanuts with the warning "contains nuts" and the decision to limit the number of asprin or paracetemol tablets that can be bought in one go, in case someone feels suicidal. If someone really feel that way, they simply go to several stores.
The metalwork/woodwork example sums it up.
We should really assess the risk assessments- and weed out the no brainers.
6. Lesley Payne
I agree entirely> We have become a society that seems to want to operate on one safe level. We are losing the ability or desire to take calculated risks without which we cannot push the boundaries in business, science or any aspect of our lives.
Children are not encouraged to be different in any way, not to strive but to conform and be safe.
It is sad that we are no longer allowed to use our own common sense.
7. Tony Odams
Couldn't agree more Peter. The following book should be put on the core curriculum for students and all managers/decision-makers. "Against the Gods. The remarkable story of risk" by Peter Bernstein puts humanity's general failings in assessing risk in context. As you say, bring back real-life learning and experiences at school and encourage managers to share learning from mistakes (we all make them after all- and it's the only way to really learn from experience), only sacking or punishing for clear failings to learn or take care. Similarly protect teachers and managers from the blame culture and litigation, if necessary by introducing no-fault compensation except in clear prima facie cases of negligence or failure. After all without risk taking how will anything change, improve or progress?
8. Peter Cochrane
I seem to have struck a chord here so this is a collective response.
In my life I have always assumed responsibility and have always been willing to take risks. As I have now reached 60 years old it seems to have worked! And with most of my life behind me, and my children safely on their way, I'm inclined to take even bigger risks and not smaller ones!
For example - it would be a better deal being a an astronaut now than when I was 20! Getting yourself killed at 20 is a much bigger tragedy than doing it at 60! (And before the H&S mob climb iut of their pram (wearing a safety harness of course) I am joking...well partially anyway!!
I think the thing is not to be silly or stupid, but the people responsible for the whole risk industry don't seem to be the sharpest tacks in the tin!
Giving them the benefit of the doubt I would say that they don't understand risk, only a**e protection. Sadly, we are breeding children in their image.
A child never exposed to real woodwork/metalwork/craft are a liablility when they get to 20 and buy an electric drill!
Without risk their can be no advance, no progress, and no positive change. It is an essential part of life and evolution. Removing risk entirely is like wearing a plastic bag on your head!