Mara Swan makes an excellent point in "Driving Time to Value in the Human Age", which is one of the articles in the book "The Rise of HR", editors Dave Ulrich, William A. Schiemann, GPHR, and Libby Sartain, SPHR.  She says we should shift our mindset to optimizing risk rather than minimizing risk.  I'm sure you've heard the saying, "With great risk comes great reward".   Well, it follows then that if we take more risks (good, calculated risks), then we should obtain greater rewards.  By playing it safe all the time, what opportunities are we missing out on?