Sam Savage always says risk is in the eye of the beholder. 2020 certainly proved it once again – while COVID-19 was an ever present risk, it affected everyone and every company differently. At the personal health and safety level, COVID-19 was and still is a serious issue with consequences ranging from mild to deadly, depending on the age group, health and other pre-conditions. At the economic level, however, COVID-19 was truly amazing, ranging from bankruptcy and financial ruin to huge profits and exponential growth. Some, like the Chinese company that makes parts for mobile devices, were just lucky when investors confused their stock with Zoom.us, others proved to be truly resilient, adapting, changing the business model and taking full advantage of the situation.
The key risk management lesson from 2020 for me was – resilience pays.
I am not the one to teach people how to live life, I can only share key takeaways for me personally:
- Safety first
- Build up immune system, regardless of what’s going on in the world
- Stay fit and healthy, do sports
- Obey the rules, wear masks, not a big deal
- Use the opportunity to reconnect with kids
- Make RISK-ACADEMY resilient
- Create online following – done 5 years ago
- Move key training courses online – done 3 years ago
- Continue to publish online. 130K reads in 2020 (20% growth). Most popular articles of 2020:
- 16 best risk management books (updated in 2020)
- Finally! An alternative to risk matrices
- 30 practical steps to implement risk management 2. Follow these steps to integrate risk management into decision making, processes and culture
- Possibly the best risk assessment template
- 5 red flags
when hiring a risk manager
- Create online formats for mentoring and consulting – will do next
- Make RISK AWARENESS WEEK resilient
- Create the biggest risk management conference and make it available completely online – done back in 2019, before it was sexy
- 4500+ participants in 2020, 35% growth to 2019
- Participants from more than 120 countries
- All workshops still available at https://2020.riskawarenessweek.com/
- Personal finances, built up retirement fund
- Redirect all savings into the markets once they collapsed in march, invest in blue chips that experienced most massive drops
- Diversify the portfolio
- Allocate some small percent to speculative and high risk investments
- Invest in what you trust, don’t invest in businesses that are bad for humanity
- Quadruple normal profits by the end of the year.
If you missed the boat last year, learn the lessons and just wait for the next global crisis. It is only 5-7 years away… if we are lucky.
So the key question to you – what will you do to make your personal life, career and family more resilient in 2021?
Check out other risk management books
RISK-ACADEMY offers online courses
Informed Risk Taking
Learn 15 practical steps on integrating risk management into decision making, business processes, organizational culture and other activities!
ISO31000 Integrating Risk Management
Alex Sidorenko, known for his risk management blog http://www.riskacademy.blog, has created a 25-step program to integrate risk management into decision making, core business processes and the overall culture of the organization.
Advanced Risk Governance
This course gives guidance, motivation, critical information, and practical case studies to move beyond traditional risk governance, helping ensure risk management is not a stand-alone process but a change driver for business.
