LE Part 9: Risk

 Taking risks, which is the main topic of Chapter 9 in Leading at the Edge, is sometimes important although we need to avoid taking unnecessary risks which can endanger organizational stabilities as stated in this chapter. I usually do not want to take risks because I'm afraid of the fact I might regret my decision later on. This chapter, however, taught me a new perspective towards taking risks. By looking through many examples, I stated to realize drastic actions involving risks can result in a huge success, and to be successful, leaders' agile decision-making abilities are essential. H-LAB, an organization where I belong, is now four years old, and for the past three years, founders of the program have mainly built up the summer school, and there were some kind of traditions, which include what kind of framework the annual summer school for high school students would be like. High school students attend two classes held by Harvard students in the morning, they eat lunch, listen to presentations given by adult people who play active roles in their society and have reflection times in the evening and go to bed at 11 o'clock. This whole framework has never changed in those three years. This year, however, almost all of the founders graduated from this program, and now there are many new executive committee members to build a summer school this year. We are now about to make some change in the fixed framework. What I think, however, is that we can take risks and try something new from this year, to make this program keep improving and better, but those risks should not affect high school students who pay so much money for this nine-day summer school and are passionately ready for absorbing many things from this program. As I belong to this team, and am responsible for offering a program, I hope to keep challenging to make this program better without giving a bad affect on people who receive our service. I hope to think about the balance between them when in an attempt to take risks.

Bye!