Communicating Risks: You may not have been duped

Very often you overhear people talking about this particular contractor who gave them a quote for a project only to start adding all sorts of bits and pieces to the original price once the commitment has been made and the project has commenced. The immediate conclusion is that the said contractor must be a crook ripping them off their hard earned cash. While there are definitely a few "cowboys" out there who would not hesitate to have a go at naïve and unsuspecting clients, my experience as a professional is that there are so many reasons why the agreed price of a project, be it building a new house, a flat renovation, or an outdoor festival, cannot be set in stone.  The reason is uncertainty.

How To Lie With Risks

 I first heard about the book "How To Lie With Statistics" while taking a Coursera course on Information Risk Management, and immediately thought I had to give it a go. Having gulped the thought-provoking and illustrative contents in a few days, I know I will never look at statistics and surveys in the same way again. Questions ranging from the reliability, bias, omissions, misrepresentations to unfounded correlations and ridiculous extrapolations will always crop up.

A Month In The Life Of A Risk Analyst

Time flies is a very common and overused cliché often cited by people when they struggle to give an account of what they have been up to. What makes the month I have spent in my new role fascinating is not that it has passed so quickly, but that it seems to have been at least three months. This is because so much has been achieved, so much insight gained, and so much is planned ahead. It is a kind or role where if you didn't have a watch, you would probably forget it's time to go home. Many people seem to arrive work very early in the morning and stay much later in the evening.

Joining a department at a time of transformation can be very exciting but having to lead on this transformation is where the challenges come. Knowing that what you are doing is unique, and that you have been brought in to provide answers and solutions, not ask question, is exhilarating. It also underscores the level of responsibility, innovativeness and independence required.

Another New Beginning

I have done it again. I have often described myself as a nomad with no permanent home. You might also want to see me as a citizen of the earth ready to settle wherever destiny calls. It's yet another new beginning in a new city and this time I am really really excited about it. On Monday 4th November I will be starting a new career as a PMO Risk Analyst with Distribution Network Operator (DNO) in London.

I have spent quite a while looking for a suitable new assignment after my last fixed term contract ended. There are so many things I could have ended up doing including being a PMO analyst with a high street retailer, Senior Stakeholder Engagement Executive, Energy Expert in government procurement service. But there is something about this new role that is so close to my heart.

I am an analyst by nature, and especially from my last role I developed a great passion for risk management out of every other aspect of project management. I read through the job description and feel the role was designed with me in mind. It's indeed a career I am looking forward to.

This new career is also already life changing even before I start. It has involved moving cities from Norwich to London. There is something really magical about being in London. It's like being at the centre of the universe with access to the best educational resources and other facilities in the world. For one thing, I think I am going to be more enlightened being here. 

Socially, I also already have a few friends living here and hope to meet a lot more people. There are  definitely no scarcity of venues for socializing. So I hope to be swinging my waist very soon to Caribbean and African music, and if time permits might even join some Gospel music or reggae band.

Back to work, what do I expect to get out of my new career path. Well, I hope and actually plan to become an authority in risk management. To achieve that, I plan to grasp as much knowledge as possible; I plan to network; I plan to be really creative; and I plan to share my new findings with you all. I also hope to make good friends and build partnerships.

And if you are wondering how risk management fits into sustainability, I would tell you it is at the very heart of it.

@davidjoneshavas social media has certain put CSR into the risk management dept, if not the p&l :) #GSBasks
— Jo Confino (@joconfino) October 17, 2013

 Just as sustainability talks about the future generation, risk management is about controlling the future.

"If there were no tomorrow there would be no risk. Time transforms risk, and the nature of risk is shaped by the time horizon" #interesting
— Christopher Ejugbo (@cejugbo) September 24, 2013

So cheers to my new beginning!