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Hello everyone. Welcome to the Five Minutes podcast. It's a very sad podcast and a very sad day because we all faced the news of what happened in Israel and what is happening in Gaza today for me, this has an absolutely special meaning because, during my time at the UN, I had been able to be in Israel many times in the West Bank. I went to Gaza; I crossed the Erez checkpoint. And it's deeply sad. And first, I cannot express my sadness, and my condolences to all of those suffering this insane terrorist attack in Israel that I'm sure does not represent the spirit and the soul of Palestinians. And it's not deserved by the civilians of Israel. So it's just nonsense. I have brothers and sisters from Israel and brothers and sisters from Palestine who are suffering and will suffer dramatically in the upcoming days weeks. Or even in the foreseeable future. And what happened when we think about these implications, it makes me think about the workshops I'm delivering here in Brazil. I'm recording this podcast from Brazil, and this week, I was fortunate to deliver several editions of a workshop that I have called Uncertainty Cycle. And these workshop is all about managing and trying to understand uncertainty. And most of the uncertainties we discussed were geopolitical, economic, environmental, technological, political and what happened today is a complete game changer in terms of geopolitics.
I know many people who may say, No, look, I live in the US, or I live in India, or I live in Brazil, so I'm far away from that conflict. You are not probably; you are a couple of hours away from the conflict in terms of physical distance. But this kind of event has the magnitude to create unprecedented challenges and changes in society, in the relationship between countries, and in the relevance of international institutions like the United Nations. And this kind of corporate agreement. It creates more conflict, it creates more isolation, and it creates a different game in the war in Ukraine. It creates a different political environment in the Southeast Asia and Asia. And this is not just about what happened yesterday. What happened yesterday was an aggression by an extremist group in Gaza that attacked. This does not express the heart and the soul of the Palestinian people. It does not. But I am sure that they will suffer dramatically as the Israeli and the Jewish brothers and sisters are facing. And this is uncertainty. And this brings a whole new dynamic to the world, to the projects, to global trade, to global relationships, to cooperation.
So everything we are seeing today is putting in a check some of the basic checks and balances we had, I would say, in the 90s, etcetera, because these changed the game and the dynamic. Israel will never be the same. I'm not saying that they will not overcome that because I'm sure they will, but it will never be the same after something like 700 800 innocent people were just killed and 100, probably 100 people are kidnapped today. So this is uncertainty. And what does this matter with someone who created a podcast to talk about project management? You would say, Ricardo, is this a political statement? Not at all. Not at all. It's a very sad statement, but it's a statement that shows you one of the key aspects I'm trying to say to everybody managing projects: one of the key competencies we all must have to succeed, managing projects is our ability to understand uncertainty and to understand the direct and indirect implications of events like these one that just happened now and how this affects the evolution of technology with several Israeli companies that are massively present in technology. How will this impact the political environment networks of countries for you that produce projects, that will export, things that will import things, and that will rely on global trade? All of these will be dramatically impacted by what happened today.
It's very it's it's as serious or even more serious than what is happening in Ukraine. These can open an unprecedented wave of violence and disruption in the world. This is why I want to share this with you because this is a very relevant flag of very turbulent times that may come to us in the short and medium term future. Let's think about that. Let's understand that for us to be competent project managers, we need to navigate and we need to be able to manage uncertainty. And at the end, you know, we all want really to make a positive impact on our projects and make all this instability. So thank you very much for listening to this podcast, and my heartfelt condolences to all of those, you know, suffering from this dramatic event. So, I will never forget you have all of you in my prayers, my dear sisters and brothers of Israel and my dear sister and brothers and Palestine, who are suffering and p
robably will suffer a lot with the insanity of the events that happened this weekend. Thank you very much, and see you next week with another 5 Minutes Podcast.
