Risk? What Risk?

January 4, 2013 / Start-up

I guess I’m not as risk-averse as some people, or maybe I just have a different view on things. I think it’s all a mental state and how you look at things. You also have to be ok with failing and with the worst possible outcome. You have to be ok with things not turning out perfectly but hopefully still has upsides. Sometimes if you actually think about what the worst possible outcome is, things don’t seem that bad.

Just to list some things that people might think as being risks:

There are risks when buying from eBay or Kijiji. I certainly had my share of encountering people trying to scam me. But the upside of saving $160, which then give me enough money to also buy a Nexus 4 whenever I can secure one, is an upside that I’m ok with.

What’s the worst outcome of leaving Microsoft and joining Well.ca? Well.ca could run out of money and I would be out of a job. The upside is that I get to learn new things and challenge myself to greater responsibility in certain areas. That said, is losing one’s job a risk specific to Well.ca? A job at Microsoft is no safer than a job at Well.ca. Remember when Microsoft started laying off people? The best job security is one’s skills.

Is it a risk to go and start a company? What if it fails like most start-ups? This took me a while to get over the mental block. Well, I believe that capable software developers will have no problem finding a job. Once I’m comfortable with that outcome, I was able to make progress on my decision. What’s another risk other than the company fails? This risk may not matter to some people but it does to me. It is the risk of regret. It is the risk of not trying. It is the risk of not working on something one believes in. There are things in the world that aren’t working as well as I want them to be. I risk having to live with the regret of not doing anything to make things better. That’s why I’m working hard on AvidTap. It is a step towards making the world a better place.