Taking risks will help you grow big in the start-up world

Risk is a great concept. Traditionally it's been associated with something only short of dangerous. We have always been taught better safe than sorry. Taking the beaten road is engrained in our psyche. We rather make it somewhere that trying to make it 'big'. We are 'okay' with success, but wary of a bigger success. This Monday I am choosing to stick to the start-up story. I am thankful for the interest my column got last week. And I am going to write about risk. To me it's not a thing. Not even an asset. And certainly not a liability. To me risk is an attitude. Taking risks is an integral part of growing into a leader. Having internal focus and conviction in your ideas will aid your ability to take chances.

Young people should take risks to succeed in life. They should embrace change and explore new ideas, new interests and follow their dream.

The other side of the coin of risk is knowledge. Which is quite an enabler for people to take chances. Let me add informed risks. I believe that young entrepreneurs or the next generation should pay more attention to the idea of preparing for everything. A new role, a new idea, a transition to a different career or whatever. When I was yet not a journalist someone told me, don't be a master of none. Being an authority on one subject makes you confident and erudite.

Some of the India's sharpest entrepreneurs will tell you that life hardly plays out as we envisage it. Look at DLF's KP Singh who was prone to take risks at different stages to experiment. From buying out a then defunct leasing business called DLF from his dad and turning it into a real estate giant. He calls two important ingredients for success. 'These to me were imagination and passion.' He adds though that "the ability to make quick decisions is critical to taking risk." It's not in business alone. Former finance minister P Chidambaram shares how he went from being a leftist to a socialist and eventually to a liberal capitalist but only because he took risks at the right time.

Chidambaram recalls his decision to go with a breakaway faction of the Congress to set up Tamil Manila Congress, a move that he would later never forget. "I was taking a big risk. I knew we were in for something new and significant. It's these moments that made me believe that young people must take risks and seek change."

You make plans but rarely does life go according to them. Some people know what they want to do from an early age and focus on it relentlessly. Others explore their options as they go along. The magical words on risk haven't been written in the new age or our digital world. They are cast in stone for years. Wasn't it T S Eliot who said, "Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far it is possible to go."