Taking Risks in Business: Losing Doesn't Make a Bet Bad.

You’re losing, Sonny.

What can be more painful than being Sonny and knowing the statement is true? You’re indeed losing. You are even about to place another bet whose justification is- I can feel it this time.

It is worse as an employee. You have a track record- an annual loss, a downsizing because of your actions, a report that reeks of irresponsibility, and ideas with only theoretical value.

You can predict the feedback- I can’t justify that to the board, it’s too risky, this is not how we do things here, do that when you start your own company, etc. You also have feedback that can cost you your job so you chose silence.

Read every article on risk-taking you can find on Google and you can tell one thing; the authors are not risk-takers. It’s too finely written for someone whose hands have been burnt. They advise you to take calculated risks. In other words, make careful, strategic, measured, thoughtful decisions with knowable outcomes. What then is the risk in that?

“How did you ever build this place?” Ask every successful entrepreneur that question and you can be sure of a constant element of a blind risk. A risk you cannot explain to anyone but those as crazy as you are, such that has no guarantee. Tony Elumelu calls it luck. Others call it grace.

If you can defend or convince others about it, it’s not the kind of risk we are talking about. This type of risk makes all the difference. They separate normal companies from the market leaders. They create the defining moment in every company’s history. They are the brand stories that can be told a million times and never become stale.

However, there are a million other similar stories that ended in tragedy. Stories that will never be told. Hence, once a company survives that uncertain period, they never want to repeat it. They do not want to go through the anxiety that comes with it, the potential losses that stare at their faces.

Repeating the risk cycle is a dreaded decision that many people never embark on in their lifetime. Though they are aware of the groundbreaking success it may yield, they are also aware of how grounded it can lead them if the bet goes bad.?

A quick dive into every valuable company today, their distinct element is their ability to constantly and continuously take risks to reinvent themselves. How many spaceships have Elon burnt? How many Meta programs are profitable? How many Heir’s subsidiaries made Tony proud? How many Dangote’s companies had to be sold?

If disrupting the world was easy, everyone would be doing it. Remember, just because you are losing does not mean it was not a good bet.