Don't Fear the Fear

The root of my annoyance with different people, attitudes, and projects at work is fear. There's a time to play it safe, and there's a time to take a chance and do something a little different. I heard a high ranking person in my building say that our company's position is that we will not accept any risk. The possibility of failure must be zero or we will not proceed. He was referring to a very specific set of circumstances, but he might as well have been talking about the vast majority of the site. 

Fear of failure permeates the organization. At the first signs that a project may not turn out as planned, people start to find ways to cover their ass. We're a research organization. Research is a risky field. It's intellectual risk, nobody is putting their body on the line, but the psychological impact of trying something that could not work out as expected is not any less.