People face risks in their everyday lives. We make decisions that can have an impact on their safety and security, health, finances, well-being, and the environment. But often, our decisions are based less on empirical evidence and objective probabilities, and more on our gut feelings, emotions, and biases. For instance, we are vulnerable to framing effects, we tend to emphasise losses more than gains, we pay undue attention to vivid and memorable risks even if the actual probabilities are miniscule, and we are influenced by popular stories and myths. These biases may affect experts in business and policy makers in government as much as they affect the average citizen.
Managers and professionals in the private sector, as well as policy analysts and regulators in the public sector will all benefit from a better understanding of their risks and how such risks should be communicated to the public. This is crucial for developing a better-informed and more discerning citizenry, and for inoculating citizens against unfounded fears and fallacies.
This four-day programme by the Lee Kuan Yew School and the Lloyd’s Register Foundation Institute for the Public Understanding of Risk at the National University of Singapore was organised to help participants accurately and intelligently analyse risks in their respective domains; appreciate how people commonly perceive risks; and communicate their risks to stakeholders, citizens/consumers, and the general public. 15 participants from around the world attended the highly interactive and engaging programme.
Details of the programme can be found here.
