Accountability… Responsibility… Blame… Frequently people confuse the first two with the third. What does this mean to you, personally?….
If you are not where you’d like to be in your profession, do you ever blame it on your boss, the economy, or your co-workers?
Do you ever have thoughts like these:
- It’s not fair.
- It’s not my job.
- It’s not my problem.
- They aren’t doing it right.
What all these statements have in common is either an attitude of blame, or an unwillingness to be accountable — two sides of the same coin.
Although accountability is highly prized, many people believe it’s others who need to be more accountable – not them. Unfortunately, wishing for others to become more accountable is simply another, more subtle version of the blame game. If we can all agree that accountability is desirable, then it makes sense that it has to start somewhere, and that somewhere can only be with you!
How can you start to create a “culture of accountability” in the workplace? How can you raise the bar in the areas of attitude, performance, courage, and, of course, behavior?
Here are 4 principles of accountability that you can use yourself, your team, and your organization:
- Responsibility — doing whatever it takes to get the best outcome
- When addressing a business priority, what do you do personally to get the best outcome?
- Resilience — staying the course, regardless of circumstances; defining what you can and cannot control and developing contingency plans
- When have you demonstrated resilience? What impact did it have on the outcome?
- Ownership — accepting the consequences of one’s actions, good or bad
- Think of a situation when something did not go as you had hoped. Did you take ownership of the outcome? If not, what could be done differently?
- Growth — leveraging successes and failures as learning experiences; being receptive to feedback; stepping outside your comfort zone
- What has been your greatest learning from a failure? How have you put the learning into practice?
Keeping these 4 principles of accountability in mind will help you lead by example and begin to create a culture of accountability in your organization.