Risk: A User’s Guide

Books · Source

Overview

I was expecting something packed with ideas (like the author's Team of Teams), but was left disappointed. Some interesting points – but this seems like it's written more for middle managers than for org designers

Key takeaways were:

• The components of risk are threat (external) and vulnerability (internal). Threats are often hard to control, but vulnerabilities are somewhat in your control
• Communication risk: if a system is blinking red, but is doing so on several different dashboards each of which has many flashing lights, it's hard to detect danger
• Narrative risk: narrative misalignment among stakeholders can cause existential risks. Symptoms include cynicism among team-members, the say-do gap, and muddle priorities
• Structural risk: offloading responsibility can cause moral hazards. For example: having a Chief Risk Officer can make individual traders think that worrying about their risk is not their job
• It's hard to avoid common information-sampling biases: spending energy and time on information that everyone already knows than information that is new and could be helpful