Welcome to Taking Stock, a podcast designed to discuss some of the most pressing issues facing corporate executives. This podcast series is designed to share thought-leading topics, ideas, and innovation with its listeners. Listen to previous episodes here. In today’s episode we walk through risk management.

Risk Management

In December 2010, Airbus announced the A320neo. This new airplane was notable for the efficiency of its engine and was estimated to save airlines millions of dollars in fuel cost. At the Paris Air Show 18 months later, they took advantage of their ‘first to market’ position to accept a record number of aircraft orders. This new aircraft had the potential to drastically shift competitive dynamics of the market and challenged industry leader, Boeing, to swiftly react.

The steps that Boeing took, both in the months and years to come, have been well chronicled, not just for the tragedy caused, but for the decisions that had been made along the way. Any organization, large or small, is continually faced with decisions that challenge leaders to toe the line between efficiency and efficacy. How to balance the push towards commercial success and organizational profits against the pull of regulatory constraints?

In this week’s Taking Stock, I sit down with David Patterson, of Clarkston Consulting to discuss risk management. David leads our Quality & Regulatory Community and has spent the past 10 years working with organizations around process improvement, program effectiveness and, most importantly, managing risk through risk management.

In this discussion, you will have the opportunity to hear David’s unique perspectives on what Boeing’s mistakes can teach us about our tolerance and risk management. Through our discussion, David hits upon the idea that the most successful organizations don’t try to avoid failure. Instead, they adapt of a mentality that embraces failure, have an iterative learning mindset and a collaborative approach to mitigating risk. Perhaps most importantly, you will learn about the concept of ‘Psychological Safety’, and how organizations’ ability to not punish those for speaking up around their ideas, questions, concerns or mistakes is perhaps the greatest lesson to be learned.

You can download and listen to Risk Management: Taking Stock with David Patterson here.

Taking Stock

In this podcast series, Clarkston Consulting Partner Steve Rosenstock sits down with experts and thought leaders from both within Clarkston and throughout its consumer products and life sciences client-base, covering a range of topics from industry trends and consumer dynamics, to organizational governance and business strategy. Steve provides you access into the passions of its guests and allows you to benefit from their stories, knowledge, and deep expertise.

Podcast production by Zach McClughen