Some people believe that success in life comes from taking risks or chances. Others believe that success results from careful planning. In your opinion, what does success come from? Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer.
It is suggested that success can come either from careful planning or from taking risks. It is not easy to take risks without a previous knowledge; inexperience can cause to make a bad decision. The most successful people have not reach success by playing with their lives. Thus, in my personal opinion success comes from careful planning; which allows recognizing easily the advantages and disadvantages of situations, estimating precisely the time invested in the process and also designing a contingency plan in case of being necessary. In fact, I believe that careful planning allows people to take risks.
To start with, careful planning involves recognizing the advantages and disadvantages of situations. These details are extremely important to have better criteria and make a good decision. If there are more disadvantages than advantages, or they are not easy to overcome, then, the project can be rejected. While this is true, without careful planning a project that surely is going to fail can be approved.
In addition, it is easier to estimate times with careful planning because every step of the process is took into account. For instance, with careful planning I can know the approximated time needed to present a final project in my work thus, I can tell to my boss the date when he will have it on his hands. If I do not plan my project I could offer to finish it in a non real time damaging my professional image. Failure of scheduled times in big projects can cause a lot of money and also your dismiss.
Moreover, a contingency plan can be designed if things are planned carefully. Unexpected situations are always predictable since the details are being analyzed. For example, in buildings there are emergency exits and stairs in case of fire, in airplanes there are life vests and oxygen masks in case of emergencies. As well as these implements, there are a large number of possibilities to overcome these non desired situations.
To conclude, careful planning is the way to success; the advantages and disadvantages are recognized, time involved is estimated and a contingency plan can be designed in order to overcome a situation and make the best decision. Finally, once planning becomes natural is feasible to take risks.
TOEFL listening lectures: A university lecture by a professor of Comparative Religion
