Unknown Unknowns and Project Risk
Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense under Presidents Gerald Ford and George W. Bush once stated, “As we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know. We know also there are known unknowns; that…
Cost of Everything Podcast
I’m honored to appear as a guest on Dr. Amritpal Agar’s podcast The Cost of Everything, which is available now! https://lnkd.in/dAwqH6R https://lnkd.in/dC_-mBq https://lnkd.in/dh5Q3kU
Risk Management Meme – A Little Planning Now Can Save a Lot of Money
One of the best memes I have seen that illustrates the importance of risk management is the image below. As the graphic points out, a little bit of planning upfront can save a project money…
There Ain’t No Such Thing As Free Ice Cream
My family and I recently ate a great seafood dinner at a restaurant. The owner came by our table and handed my young son a coupon for “free ice cream” that we could redeem at…
Mask Mandates and New COVID-19 Cases in September for Nashville
There are 10 counties in the metropolitan Nashville area. Only three of these counties never issued a mask mandate. Of the others, one (Williamson) let theirs expire at the end of August. The other counties…
The Impact of Lifting Mask Mandates – A Tale of Two Counties
Both Rutherford and Williamson counties in Tennessee issued mask mandates this summer. Williamson county started theirs on July 8th, while Rutherford county waited until July 22nd. On July 8th, both counties were experiencing a weekly…
Now is Not the Time to Lift Mask Mandates
The mayor of Rutherford County, Tennessee (where my family and I live) just announced he is lifting the mask mandate. This is not the time to do this. COVID-19 cases in Tennessee have been surging…
The Origins of Risk Management – “Trust Not All Your Goods to One Ship”
During the Renaissance, the humanist scholar Desiderius Erasmus compiled a list of proverbs whose title in English is Adages. These were largely compiled from ancient Greek and Roman sources. They included a variety of expressions…
The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same
There is an old saying in French that translates as “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” This epigram is applicable to cost growth. Oxford professor Bent Flyvbjerg has studied cost overruns…
Pascal’s Wager – Why Consequence is More Important than Likelihood in Managing Risk
The study of probability began in France in the seventeenth century. The mathematician Blaise Pascal was friends with two gamblers who were obsessed with a dice game that was the forerunner to craps. One of…