Risk is the most common topic that comes up in our conversations with entrepreneurs and so each week we ask entrepreneurs to talk to us on the record about how they think about risk.

Alicia Rau | Fashion Designer & Business Owner

Taking risks can be scary and uncomfortable, but it plays a key role in growing as a person. I had to overcome my fear of failure before starting my business. Selling original designs and being independently funded, there was a lot of uncertainty. When Bête Noire opened I threw all my self doubt out the window. Read more>>

Seth Mayer | Fine Art Photographer

Taking risks in my personal life and my art has afforded me better health physically and mentally. By lessening my dependence on norms and group think, I was able to take back my health through nutrition and stress reduction, With my art, taking risks allows for mistakes which in turn feels like messages from the universe for which I can utilize those mistakes and create new work I might not have consciously have thought about. Read more>>

Anita Marie Conkling | Art Gallery Curator

Risk-taking is part of being a leader, and I was born a leader. Being the eldest of six children, good management skills were formed at a very early age, and have been my “super-power” in business. Strategic planning is my key to mitigated risk, in my personal life and business career. It is important to me to be prepared for an opportunity to find me, as it often has, and know what I can and cannot take on. Read more>>

Lisa Foster | Podcast Host

I have never been a risk taker, always playing it safe, staying on the straight and narrow. But as time passed, I realized that everything in life is a risk, even the things we feel are safe. That 9-5 job that offers us benefits and a steady income can suddenly end due to layoffs. With risk, however, comes great reward. We shouldn’t let our fear of failure stop us from trying something new. Read more>>

Mandy Simpson | Actor & Production Designer

Taking a risk means you want to change something. Changing will always help you grow. Without this need I would not be where I am today. I grew up in a small farming town in Western Washington called Sedro Woolley. Everyone knows everyone or has at least heard of them. Fortunately, there is a big theatre community there so that became my other family and my sole focus. Read more>>