Uncertainty, Risk and Success

"Risk is what you don't know..." (*)
... did not anticipate...or refuse to believe ...
"Is it worth it ? let me work it ..." (*)


Uncertainty
deals with the level of unknown, it depends a lot on the context.
(Unknown unknowns, the things impacting me I haven't got a clue about)
This is the most difficult part, because it involves trying to understand which among the myriad of scenarios/sequence of events is a possible reality.

Dealing effectively with uncertainty requires extraordinarily adaptive skills in terms of information processing; it also requires interpretative (heuristics), qualitative and creative methods, because you need to figure out the seemingly inconceivable or apparently impossible situations that could affect you.

Reflect on these statements: "imagination is more important than knowledge, knowledge is by definition limited, imagination is not", "think outside the box, imagine what can go wrong", "nothing is impossible", "think the unthinkable", "there will always be things that you can't conceive".

Choosing what to include and what to exclude from your attention (so called framing issues) must be appropriately addressed. This means deciding which information filters to apply in your own information processing protocols. Finally, how you decide to view the world determines your assumptions. Regularly challenging information filters and assumptions is a major element of effective uncertainty management.

Because stability is an illusion, change is reality. There is also a hierarchy in uncertainty and randomness, that's why sometimes you can measure and model change...

Quantifiable Risk
is what you do not usually expect but still can estimate based on previous experience, what you try to measure, manage and plan, based on possible scenarios and estimated probability of occurrence.
It's about what you believe you can predict and control.
(Known unknowns)
Estimating unexpected risk involves concepts like expectancy (probability-weighted outcomes), variance, statistical moments, mathematical modelling and simulations, studies of infrequent but realized events that already occurred in the past (k-sigma events).

Success
is a subjective perception, it refers to a desired outcome, in the form of a reward or an avoided threat.
The basic and natural definition of desirable outcome is survival success.

Desired outcome can also depend very much on the context/environment, since it can mean:
- personal perception of success (what you want to get / avoid)
- social perception of success (as defined by other persons)

Moreover, there is also a resource constraint factor to consider:
- a time-horizon element: short-term versus long-term effects.
- costs, depletion rate of other resources driving change (providers of energy driving change)

Success metric = actual reward-realized threat
(+avoided threat-missed opportunity)

it's not a one-off kind of thing, much more a cumulative outcome...



(*) References available on demand.