The Risk Adverse Leader

I know that these days it is more difficult than ever to encourage team members to take some calculable risks. Even leaders and managers are sometimes hesitant to encourage risk-taking. At he same time,many committed employees are having difficulty balancing their professional and personal life so risk taking is on the bottom of the list. Technology seems to have placed GREATER demands on our time and face-to-face relationships are more important than ever. The current economic and social pressures seem to be pulling at one another. Add to that the generational differences and managing risk, productivity, satisfaction and engagement is a double-edged sword for many leaders. In such a risk adverse environment how can we encourage team members to take risks?I wanted to take this moment to mention that it is our duty as managers to help our team members to make the best decisions in terms of risk tolerance. This almost always means that we need to KNOW their personal goals, circumstances and current challenges. Often managers and leaders shy away from asking too many “personal questions” or challenging team members to take risks. This is particularly true in rabid HR compliance states like CA and NJ. Let me just say the consequences of taking NO RISKS is even higher. Just as critical, consider the dis-service we are doing for our employees when we avoid this kind of discussion or back-off challenging them.Here is an article written a while back but discusses this in greater detail. Hope you find it to be valuable. Risk Taking Culture