SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT

TO BE TRULY HUMBLE IS TO KNOW
THE TRUTH ABOUT YOURSELF

Risk Analysis

Evaluating and managing the risks that you face

Almost everything we do in today's business world involves a risk of some kind: customer habits change, new competitors appear, factors outside your control could delay your project. But formal risk analysis and risk management can help you to assess these risks and decide what actions to take to minimize disruptions to your plans. They will also help you to decide whether the strategies you could use to control risk are cost-effective.

How to Use the Tool:

Here we define risk as 'the perceived extent of possible loss'. Different people will have different views of the impact of a particular risk – what may be a small risk for one person may destroy the livelihood of someone else.

One way of putting figures to risk is to calculate a value for it as:

risk = probability of event x cost of event

Doing this allows you to compare risks objectively. We use this approach formally in decision making with Decision Trees.

To carry out a risk analysis, follow these steps:

1. Identify Threats:

The first stage of a risk analysis is to identify threats facing you. Threats may be:

·         Human – from individuals or organizations, illness, death, etc.

·         Operational – from disruption to supplies and operations, loss of access to essential assets, failures in distribution, etc.

·         Reputational – from loss of business partner or employee confidence, or damage to reputation in the market.

·         Procedural – from failures of accountability, internal systems and controls, organization, fraud, etc.

·         Project – risks of cost over-runs, jobs taking too long, of insufficient product or service quality, etc.

·         Financial – from business failure, stock market, interest rates, unemployment, etc.

·         Technical – from advances in technology, technical failure, etc.

 ·         Natural – threats from weather, natural disaster, accident, disease, etc.

 ·         Political – from changes in tax regimes, public opinion, government policy, foreign

                         influence, etc.

·         Others

This analysis of threat is important because it is so easy to overlook important threats. One way of trying to capture them all is to use a number of different approaches:

·         Firstly, run through a list such as the one above, to see if any apply.

·         Secondly, think through the systems, organizations or structures you operate, and analyze risks to any part of those.

·         See if you can see any vulnerabilities within these systems or structures.

·         Ask other people, who might have different perspectives.

2. Estimate Risk:

Once you have identified the threats you face, the next step is to work out the likelihood of the threat being realized and to assess its impact.

One approach to this is to make your best estimate of the probability of the event occurring, and to multiply this by the amount it will cost you to set things right if it happens. This gives you a value for the risk.

3. Manage Risk:

Once you have worked out the value of risks you face, you can start to look at ways of managing them. When you are doing this, it is important to choose cost effective approaches – in most cases, there is no point in spending more to eliminating a risk than the cost of the event if it occurs. Often, it may be better to accept the risk than to use excessive resources to eliminate it.

Risk may be managed in a number of ways:

·         By using existing assets:
Here existing resources can be used to counter risk. This may involve improvements to existing methods and systems, changes in responsibilities, improvements to accountability and internal controls, etc.

·         By contingency planning:
You may decide to accept a risk, but choose to develop a plan to minimize its effects if it happens. A good contingency plan will allow you to take action immediately, with the minimum of project control if you find yourself in a crisis management situation. Contingency plans also form a key part of Business Continuity Planning (BCP) or Business Continuity management (BCM).

·         By investing in new resources:
Your risk analysis should give you the basis for deciding whether to bring in additional resources to counter the risk. This can also include insuring the risk: Here you pay someone else to carry part of the risk – this is particularly important where the risk is so great as to threaten your or your organization's solvency.

4. Review:

Once you have carried out a risk analysis and management exercise, it may be worth carrying out regular reviews. These might involve formal reviews of the risk analysis, or may involve testing systems and plans appropriately.
 

Key Points:

Risk analysis allows you to examine the risks that you or your organization face. It is based on a structured approach to thinking through threats, followed by an evaluation of the probability and cost of events occurring.

Risk analysis forms the basis for risk management and crisis prevention. Here the emphasis is on cost effectiveness. Risk management involves adapting the use of existing resources, contingency planning and good use of new resources.

The Gift of Loneliness

Only now, half-way through my fifty-fifth year of life, has it dawned on me that the horrible loneliness I have often regarded as a curse, is actually a gift.

After my bitter divorce. I have suffered through prolonged, and intense periods of loneliness, and the feeling of being unloved. Even the temptation to feel unlovable.

In her book, "God's Joyful Surprise", Sue Monk Kidd says "conversion is a process of growth and change. It begins with God and goes on silently within us, flowering out at certain unique times as He calls us to decisive moments, rediscovery, awakening, just as that initial moment of conversion did."

During the last eight years, I have agonized with a specific loneliness, which has seemed utterly useless and destructive. But this past year, God has spoken to me, by guiding my heart slowly, ever closer to Himself. In the silence of this time, I have prayed more often, and more earnestly than I have for many years. Before, I was content with my spiritual growth, and very intently teaching what I knew, to my children. As my three children were growing up in my absence, it was as though a wild wind was tearing through my soul, and I felt that my ship was sinking. I did not know where I was, and I was afraid. But God calmed my inner storm. 

* And he arose , and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still . And the wind ceased , and there was a great calm. Mark 4:39

Now, I have developed a new longing to KNOW God better. Not only that, but I have need to find out what He wants me to use the rest of my life for. Or at least, the next few years of my existence on earth. Now that I am back from my 7 years mission in Afghanistan, I feel so empty. I feel aimless, useless, and without a goal for the Lord.

* Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not. Psalm 37:7

And thus, these years ahead will prove to be a certain unique time. Through many prayers in my lonely silence, I feel God is telling me something new. Perhaps He would have told me before, but I just never had time to stay still and listen. I have certainly never had the time to just spend in silence, in stillness, and tell my Heavenly Father that I am listening for Him.

* Stand in awe, and sin not: commune with your own heart upon your bed, and be still. Selah Psalm 4:4 
The revelation is that God loves me even when I am doing nothing specific for Him. He loves me just the way I am - the way He created me - even when I am feeling lost and still. Useless and helpless. Certainly, I know He has more for me to do for Him. But right now, this year, has been His time for me to behold a new epiphany of comprehension. In my "dark time" there has been a light all along. The gentle, soft light of early dawn. The light of the love of my God, in the beginning sunrise of my new life - the life of my older years. It is a process of growth and change.

* Be still, and know that I am God. Psalm 46:10

I almost see that light now. It is still soft, but it illuminates the darkness, and the colors of day are returning slowly. The blacks and grays, the shadows and blurs are taking on hues, shapes, and clarity. I know He will show me what I am to do with my new time of older time. But I don't have to worry any longer. I can be quite content now. My loneliness is virtually gone. My feeling of uselessness has faded away. God has shown me that my life itself is as a flower for Him. The bloom of my life will ever be bright, until my last breath. Just because I live, is not only a gift from God, but also, a gift TO God. What an astounding awakening!

He has created us all to go through stages of life. The peaceful pre-birth has no loneliness. Then we go through birth, infancy/toddlerhood, childhood/teenhood, young adulthood, middle age, old age, death. Each stage has its own business, its own focus, its own purpose. Moving from one stage to another can be very painful.

It occurs to me as I write this note, that each of those stages are longer than the one before, until death. Birth takes hours or days; infancy/toddlerhood takes perhaps three years; childhood/teenhood lasts sixteen years; young adulthood lasts perhaps twenty years, or twenty-five. Middle age, depending on when a person thinks it begins, may last thirty years. Old age may last up to forty years or even more. At least in my family, it does. Each stage overlaps the next, and the new one slides into itself in slow motion.

Our society sends very strong messages via the media, that young adulthood is the only good time of life. This causes people to suffer deep injustices, for there is no template for how to live an older life. There is little guidance to what life will be like, once the fire of passion, the firm skin of youth, the whirlwind of energy has changed. I'm sure it has to do with money. Television can sell products to gullible young people. Movies make tremendous money from young people. Etc. But it leaves at least half of life an open book. An empty page. An unknown land. Many other cultures do not do this. But ours does. So how do we begin charting our new course?

Does one stage prepare us for the next? Is each one lasting longer, because the next will have such new challenges, and the preparing takes longer?

* I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry. Psalm 40:1

Loneliness can strike at any age, from the time we are born. But from what I have seen, it often affects us the worst as we grow older. If someone lives to be a hundred, for instance, they have likely outlived all their friends, their spouse, and often most of their children. As we live, we lose those we love, to divorce, to death, or other calamities. The thing that is the hardest, for most, is to be forced to live in a nursing home. That is a loneliness that I cannot even imagine myself of ever enduring.

However, I have seen teenagers in such anguish of extreme loneliness that they cannot sustain the will to live. Conversely, I have seen my own relatives in their late seventies and eighties, frail, but full of the joy of the Lord, and looking forward to seeing Him, and being in Heaven.

It's what we DO with our loneliness that makes the difference. Do we crawl in a hole and hide with our misery? Do we drown our misery in a bottle or a pill? Do we go to strangers, and try to find comfort? Do we go to family and friends, and hunt for comfort? Or do we go to the Lord, where there is always comfort to be found?

I am in motion, as I put my inner thoughts into this note, although the rest of my body is still. For the purpose of God is very slowly being revealed to me; and the love of God for me, is dawning upon me in an altogether new way.

If I had not been so desperately lonely for these eight years, I don't believe I would ever have gone quietly to God in deep need, and talked to Him for so long. I don't think I would have looked at the sky, and told Him I was listening for His guidance. Listening. How much time have I spent listening for God? Not so much until now. I love talking to Him, while looking at the sky. For it makes me feel closer to Him, gazing in His direction. Now, I also remain still, and listen. Occasionally, the solution to a problem will pop into my mind, while I wait quietly. Often a verse, or a line from a hymn, or just a feeling of deep peace will come to me. God speaks to us this way.

I am learning all the time. Shifting emotional gears from one stage of life to another has always been difficult for me. But after this big crunch of poorly shifted gears, over the past eight years, I believe I have moved into a new speed. A slow but smooth speed. I've been in park for so long. But now I am moving. Moving toward a new goal I don't even know about. Yet I have complete faith that God has that goal all ready for me to find.

That hideous loneliness has not been a curse after all. It has been a blessing. It has been a time when God has been putting grease on the gears, so I could shift yet again. My loneliness has been a gift.

I praise God, for loving me enough, to stay with me through all these stages of life, and to continue to teach me, through the ways He created me to learn best.

I NEED YOU NOW

My friend, I need you now

Please take me by the hand.

Stand by me in my hour of need,

Take time to understand.

Take my hand, dear friend,

And lead me from this place.

Chase away my doubts and fears,

Wipe the tears from off my face.

Friend, I cannot stand alone.

I need your hand to hold,

The warmth of your gentle touch

In my world that's grown so cold.

Please be a friend to me

And hold me day by day.

Because with your loving hand in mine,

I know we'll find the way.

Be Focused

An ancient Indian sage was teaching his disciples the art of archery. He put a wooden bird as the target and asked them to aim at the eye of the bird.

The first disciple was asked to describe what he saw. He said, "I see the trees, the branches, the leaves, the sky, the bird and its eye..."

The sage asked this disciple to wait. Then he asked the second disciple the same question and he replied, "I only see the eye of the bird."

The sage said, "Very good, then shoot." The arrow went straight and hit the eye of the bird.

:: Moral of the Story ::
Unless we focus, we cannot achieve our goal.

It is hard to focus and concentrate, but it is a skill that can be learned.

Allow Your Own Inner Light to Guide You

There comes a time when you must stand alone.

You must feel confident enough within yourself to follow your own dreams.

You must be willing to make sacrifices.

You must be capable of changing and rearranging your priorities so that your final goal can be achieved.

Sometimes, familiarity and comfort need to be challenged.

There are times when you must take a few extra chances and create your own realities.

Be strong enough to at least try to make your life better.

Be confident enough that you won't settle for a compromise just to get by.

Appreciate yourself by allowing yourself the opportunities to grow, develop, and find your true sense of purpose in this life.

Don't stand in someone else's shadow when it's your sunlight that should lead the way.

Thoughts...

Don't hold to anger, hurt or pain.             
They steal your energy and keep you from love!

I believe the single most significant decision I can make on a day-to-day
basis is my choice of attitude, my successes or failures, fame or pain.


It is more important than my past, my education, my bankroll, what other
people think of me or say about me, my circumstances, or my position.
Attitude keeps me going or cripples my progress.

It alone fuels my fire or assaults my hope.


When my attitudes are right, there is no barrier too high, no valley too
deep, no dream too extreme, no challenge too great for me!