Learning how to deal with risk is an empowering experience

Dealing with risk is a part of life and how we tackle it has a big impact on everyone’s health,

RISKS. It feels like they’re everywhere these days. And gigantic ones too.

For many of us, Covid-19 feels like the biggest risk right now, bringing with it the risk to life, the risk to jobs, our mental health and even the bonds of community, as people disagree so ramatically on vaccinations.

And it’s not the only enormous risk we face.

Climate change remains a significant risk to the future of life on Earth. As the world repares to gather in

Glasgow for COP26, the next round of UN climate talks, it can feel as though we’re living on borrowed time.

Geo-political conflict is another devastating risk that remains ever-present. We have nervously watched the unfolding events in Afghanistan and held our breath for what the future may hold.

On the face of it, it all seems grim. But it need not be, if we confront the risks and learn how to respond.

That is why Tasmanian Leaders – Tasmania’s premier leadership development organisation – has organised an important event next month on how we can better respond to risks – large and small.

The Leadership + Risk Symposium, which will take place in Devonport on September 17, will feature internationally renowned risk experts along with top speakers from Tasmania and Australia.

The keynote speaker is Michele Wucker, a very highprofile and in-demand American commentator, policy analyst and author of the hugely influential book ‘The Gray Rhino’.

According to Ms Wucker, Gray Rhinos are highly probable, high impact threats which for a variety of reasons we invariably fail to either prepare for or handle, until it’s too late.

Perhaps you can think of a few Gray Rhino experiences in your own organisation or personal life?

Other speakers at the event include Will Smith, 2020 Young Tasmanian of the Year, and Hanny Allston, founder of the 2018 Telstra Tasmanian Small and Succeeding Business of the Year, Find Your Feet.

Despite having had many thousands of years of practice, humans remain stubbornly deficient at dealing with risks. It is not a peachy situation. Especially when those risks switch into harsh reality.

But this deflating flaw in our relationship to risk can be fixed. And that’s what the Leadership + Risk symposium will seek to help us do.

The symposium will explore how to better understand risk and how to recognise the weighty costs of inaction.

It will also investigate – in a spirit of daring optimism – how to transform risks into new opportunities and how to transform the fear that risk whips up into a fertile seedbed for generating bold new ideas.

Attendees will be encouraged to change old ways of doing things. That’s not easy. But it is essential because we can’t fix the old problems with the old approaches. We must tackle risks by taking risks, positive risks in our thinking and behaviour.

The Leadership + Risk symposium is aimed at everyone with an interest in risk and leadership including those working in the public sector, and not-for-profits as well as small to medium business owners, executives and managers, entrepreneurs, and educators. It’s for all leaders, whether you hold a formal leadership title or play an informal leadership role as someone who influences, guides and encourages others.

So many of us are feeling burned by the many challenges of this intensely difficult time.

We’re inviting Tasmanians to take one day out from all that and come along to be part of an incredible event with distinguished experts, panel discussions, workshops and opportunities to meet new people.This event is an amazing professional development opportunity. Don’t risk missing out.

The Leadership + Risk Symposium is on 2021 at the paranaple Convention Centre, Devonport.