Overview
A primary motivation to perform environmental testing is fear: fear of lawsuits, fear of citations, fear of illness. More often than not, that fear extends to those you love, too; your spouse, your children, or even your pets. While fear undeniably drives action, it all too often drives that action in the wrong direction, causing damage to personal, employee, and client relationships. Techtron uses expertise, scientific tools, and our ability to communicate to help those around us let go of their fears, so you can embrace and manage the risks that cause fear in the first place.
Fear versus Risk
Fear is often personal, left uncontained, and nearly impossible to manage on its own, resulting in “running from” rather than “running toward” opportunities. Fear motivates immediate action. If positively harnessed, however, that action can be directed toward evaluating risk. To do so, we must first understand what it really means to take a risk. Risk is the possibility of negative consequences related to an action or situation; it’s quantifiable and can be managed. In fact, Risk Management - defined as the systematic process of identifying, assessing, and mitigating threats or uncertainties - is an integral part of every successful endeavor.
Addressing Fear-Based Decision Making
Fear is often expressed as a demand rather than a question. Therefore, rather than obeying the demand, it’s the perfect time to work on understanding the source of this demand. Always ask the important questions: why do you want this done? What are you hoping to solve? Who else is involved in this demand? Sometimes a client needs exactly what they say they need, while other times, they are really asking for help in the form of a demand. It is up to you to know the difference.
Why Mobile Lab Testing Matters
Fear is exacerbated by incomplete knowledge, and the mobile lab is an amazing tool to share knowledge and show results. Rather than a client feeling like they must defer to your expertise, you have the opportunity to immediately share what makes you an expert in the first place, and take them along with the process. Working in this way gives you so much more credibility. Rather than leaving it as a mysterious airborne toxin, show your clients what the mold or asbestos in their air looks like. Allow their curiosity to take hold and explain what you are doing in real time. One of the first steps to gaining trust is to share knowledge, and what better way to share knowledge than through the analytical process.
How to Embrace Risk
The first thing to know is that there’s no such thing as “Safe”. There are only acceptable levels of risk to the individual or organization that is facing those risks. An attorney cannot fathom the risk of walking an I-beam 10 stories off the ground, just as a steel worker cannot fathom the risk of 30 people crammed into a tenth story conference room, all breathing the same air. Once risks are acknowledged, a plan can be put into place to manage risks that meet each client’s individual needs. This results in ownership of risk. It makes risk controllable and predictable. It empowers clients to positively reduce risk because now, they run toward it rather than away from it.
Building Healthy Relationships
When a client reaches out to Techtron, it’s easy to think that they are running toward us. However, the initial contact is likely that they just happened to run into us while “running from” something else. If we recognize that fear brought us together, we can then move forward and toward understanding that fear, to focus it toward solutions that they may not have even been aware of. For example, when a client asks to test for asbestos in floor tile, what they may really be saying is “I’m afraid my family has been exposed to asbestos.” Rather than blindly following orders, ask them questions to get to the root of their concerns. Then develop a plan that provides concrete solutions, – not just appeasement. Techtron Environmental Solutions is not just a slogan! As an expert, it is important that Techtron builds relationships in a way that clients don’t call us demanding that we do a task. They call us because they know that we will identify the root causes of their problems and partner with them to create solutions.
This is why Techtron Matters
History is rife with those that exploit fear for personal gain and power. This is seen from the micro (one person to another) to the macro (an entire civilization being controlled by the few). Techtron does the opposite: we provide the people, the experience, and the tools to empower our clients to recognize and evaluate risk. Together, we mitigate and manage these risks in a manner that solves their immediate crises while meeting their long-term needs. Do we make the world a better place? Maybe not noticeably – but we do make people’s lives better by helping them make decisions that best suits them. And a world motivated by embracing and managing risk is a better world than one motivated by manipulation through fear.
