Random the Book

Questions for you:

• When making decisions under uncertainty, do I acknowledge the full range of possible outcomes or focus only on most likely scenarios?
• How comfortable am I with probabilistic thinking rather than seeking single “right” answers?
• Do I understand the limitations of predictions about rare but high-impact events?

Questions for your organisation:

• Are our risk assessment processes sophisticated enough to handle deep uncertainty and multiple variables?
• Do we test our assumptions against ranges of scenarios rather than single predicted futures?
• How do we communicate uncertainty in our planning without paralyzing decision-making?

Further reading

Research into COVID transmission using Monte Carlo simulations: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9135486/#:~:text=Further%20Monte%20Carlo%2Dtype%20studies,based%20on%20proximity%20infection%20spread

A definition of Probabilistic Risk Assessment from NASA: http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codeq/qnews/pra.pdf