Balancing Risk vs Reward — Breaking Down An Open Door
Learning to walk through a door that has been opened for you.
Learning to Balance Risk vs. Reward
I am not a big risk taker. I take prudent risks. I won’t do bungee jumping, but have gone riding in a hot air balloon. I passed on climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro, but did climb up to the Tiger’s Nest Monastery in Bhutan. I don’t scuba dive but love snorkeling.
At work, I was known for taking on special assignments and being successful. There is risk that comes from this — working with different leaders and customers, and navigating uncharted territory.
My risk-reward profile is medium risk, but — high reward! I learned to reduce the risk by working hard and increased the reward by taking advantage of any door that was opened for me.
The last — taking advantage of an open door — was a lesson that I learned from a great boss.
Learning My Lesson
The first time an open door presented itself to me, I was working in Seattle and had been asked to make a presentation to a team of visiting Japanese executives. I was part of a small group of business development managers, and the project lead was away on travel, so I was asked to fill in at short notice.
About a month later, I was again asked to step-in to brief a different project. This time to potential customers from Nigeria. At both these meetings our Company President and many senior executives were in attendance.
Later in the week, I visited with Rudy, the vice president, with whom I had a good relationship. I expressed my concern to him that it felt like I was being asked to make the presentation to the non-white visitors because of the color of my skin and not because I was the right person. Was I being asked so that my presence would add “color” to our team?
We talked for a while and then he said something to me that has stayed with me all these years. He said, “You have a choice to make. You can either worry about why the door has been opened for you or you can walk in through the open door.” He continued, “There could have been any number of reasons why you were asked to make the presentation the first time, but if you hadn’t done well, you would not have been invited back.”
“Don’t try to break down an open door,” he added. I took it to mean “don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” As my mother didn’t raise no fool, I listened to Rudy and learned to leverage the open door then and whenever the opportunity arose in the future.
Leveraging A Simple Question
Years later, I ran into Chris, our Corporate COO, in the buffet line at a semi-social event. I had not seen him since my transfer a couple of years earlier. He asked me how I was doing. I responded with my usual glib phrase — “fantastic!” He turned around and said, “No, how the f*** are you really doing?” I paused and frankly stated, “I am not intellectually challenged in my current assignment.”
The following week, I got a call from his staff. They asked me to interview for a position on the board of directors of a national lab. I panicked! I knew nothing about the technology (nuclear bombs!) or the customer (Department of Energy) and wondered how I would add value to the board. However, I went through the process.
I interviewed with the other board members and discovered that I would be the first non-white person on the board. Again, I wondered if I was being asked to join the board for my ethnicity, as there was a big affirmative action push in the corporation. As part of the interview process, I asked the question, “Why me?” and discovered that they needed a specific skill that I would bring to the table.
I had never been on a corporate board before and I was anxious, but I accepted the offer when it came. That was the start of my long corporate board journey, something I have come to really love. The risk was worth the reward and I am grateful to Chris for opening the door for me.
Summary
It has been over 35 years since Rudy’s words of wisdom. Even now, when I run across an opportunity, I suppress my desire to question it and then consciously walk through the open door. My mother didn’t raise no fool!
Rudy’s words have stayed with me.
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S. K. Gupta is a former senior executive of a Fortune 50 corporation. He enjoys researching and writing about the not-so-obvious things in life. Feedback welcome. sk.gupta.us@gmail.com.
