Not Risk Free
(Mobile home, caravan in British English, near the waterfront at Sabine Pass, Texas. Photo by Bonnie D. Huval, copyright 2015)
Changes don’t have to be as extensive as a root-and-branch revamp to seem hazardous. We get accustomed to our ways of doing and being, and it’s easy to feel that any adjustments at all will be unsettling, maybe even awful. Why take the risk? Why not keep everything the way it is?
Sometimes, although there is risk in making changes, there is even more risk in keeping everything the way it is.
In an era of galloping climate change, building houses in a conventional ground-level manner anywhere other than definitely high ground is high risk. Where I grew up, we put houses up on short piers in town, or on stilts closer to the sea. After such hurricanes as Rita and Ivan, some houses that used to be on 8 to 10 foot stilts are now on 16 to 20 foot stilts. People park cars underneath or use the footprint on the ground as recreational space. They often put a deck halfway up for more recreational space, catching breezes better and above most of the mosquitoes.
A third of Pakistan is flooded right now. Is it more risky to build replacement housing up in the air if they can, or where it was before?
Stans, the supermarket at the center of our village, looked ahead and put solar panels on the entire south-facing side of their roof. They did it years ago when such systems were more costly to put in. It must have seemed like a substantial financial risk when installation costs were high and energy costs were not too bad. It has positioned them well for the situation now.
Finding ways to let more staff work from home has turned out to be a wise choice. Companies still resisting that are now at a disadvantage in multiple ways. They have leases, business rates (in the UK) and utility bills higher than competitors who are able to let some staff work from home. To add insult to injury, a recent British study found that people working from home are on average 13% more productive than counterparts who commute to an office.
The world changes. We usually don’t have a risk-free way to respond. Making changes to adapt to our shifting situation is a risk, but so is standing still. We know that sooner or later, if we stand still, the world will pass us by.
There’s a saying that fortune favors the brave. Let’s look at what’s happening in as clear-eyed a way as we can, decide how to respond, and go for it. Let’s always try to be brave.