# Uncertainty, Work, and Ancient Wisdom By:: [[Brian Heath]] 2023-08-20 When something starts, managers and organizations want nothing more than analysts to look into the crystal ball and tell them whether it will work. The anxiety produced by uncertainty propagates throughout the organization. The problem is one always wonders whether it will work for sure. There are a million scenarios one could imagine where it fails or succeeds. Our ability to imagine these scenarios is a blessing and curse. It allows us to imagine what might be and strive for it. It also allows us to be consumed by an imaginary world of what-ifs. When faced with such situations, it's best to focus on what one can control. Can one work harder today to improve the likelihood of success? Yes. Can one measure incremental improvement day by day? Yes. Can one ensure success via a fancy forecasting model? Absolutely not, no matter what some analysts say. If fact, it's unlikely that any analyst will tell you such a thing. There is some cosmic force in the universe that once becomes an "analyst," one begins to hedge a lot more. One learns of uncertainty, probabilities, randomness, the limits of models, and predictably unpredictable chaotic attractors. If one spends enough time encountering the anxiety of uncertainty from organizations, one will eventually come to several key conclusions. First, as already mentioned, no model can guarantee success. Second, and perhaps most importantly, no model is more valuable than doing the work. Models do nothing other than impact your feelings and thoughts about a situation. Work is still required to make it happen, even if one cannot guarantee the outcome. Only some organizations and managers get this. After all the complexity and anxiety stoked by what-ifs, one is left with core beliefs, systemic principles, and the human condition. In other words, the wisdom passed down through the ages represents the most extensive analytics study ever conducted. These include things like making more money than you spend, slow and steady wins the race, the golden and silver rules, chaos creates opportunity, to err is human, the only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing, and some things are within your control, and some are not. #### Related Items [[Forecasting]] [[Anxiety]] [[Organization]] [[Predictive Analytics]] [[The Human Condition]] [[Wisdom]] [[Analytics]]