A Culture of Accountability

The single most repeated complaint I hear from leaders is usually that there is a lack of accountability in their organization. It might be a team missing a deadline, and not seeming to care or understand that other things relied upon it. It could be a team missing a revenue target and instead of gettin back down to work, celebrating just because. Or simply people not caring about the quality of their product or work. Accountability it seems is waning in the workplace today.

The first challenge I present leadership teams with is this: What does accountability mean to you? I am not suggesting that these leaders don’t know what accountability means, but more importantly, that it is not a word, it is a behavior and they first must break down what the behaviors look like, before they can figure out how to encourage these behaviors in the culture around them.

Each executive team and culture have to come up with their own definition and behaviours, but as a suggestion, this is what it means to me.

Accountability:

- When someone needs to volunteer for a task that no one else owns, you raise your hand.

- When you are responsible for meeting a deadline, not only do you frequently volunteer updates on progress (without being nagged for them), and manage expectations about whether the deadline will be met, but you proactively learn what else rides on that deadline and openly and honestly communicate any delays. And you do everything in your power to meet the deadline.

- When you miss a deadline, you don’t blame others. You can inform me on the context of why, but take ownership and apologize.

- When you mess up, own up, fess up and apologize and fix it without complaint.

- When you are leading other peoples’ work, you take ownership for the quality as if it were your own, don’t let your team screw up and then blame them. The mistakes made by your team are yours, because you didn’t catch it, prevent it or teach for them. 

These are just a few examples of accountability in terms of behaviors, exhibited by people and teams on a daily basis. There are I am sure, many more.  

So what might it look like in your organization if you wanted to create a culture of accountability? Maybe some of the following;

1. Demonstrate accountability in the executive team and openly across the management organization, there is nothing quite like role modeling a behavior to make it matter

2. Talk about accountability in terms of behaviors, not character flaws. You won’t encourage people to be more accountable if they feel their values or character or work ethic is being attacked.

3. Reward accountability every day, even for the little things. Call it out, say “thank you for taking ownership and accountability for that”.

4. Make it safe to make mistakes, without accepting excuses, poor communications or mismanaged expectations. If people can’t safely admit to a mistake, they will fear taking accountability and your customers will discover your mistakes for you.

5. Demonstrate you trust your people; people who don’t feel trusted don’t take accountability as they know the deck is stacked against them from the start. 

6. Demonstrate you listen to your people. People who aren't heard don’t feel empowered and then they won’t take accountability because they don't feel respected. Reacting emotionally at the first mention of a possible missed deadline never gives your team the opportunity to take accountability and then present their alternate ideas. It prevents them from having the courage in the future to be honest with you. Knowing we are trusted, being given the chance to be heard, and knowing it is safe to admit mistakes and be open, encourages us to be accountable.

You can do a lot as a leadership team to encourage accountability and proactively make it part of your culture, but what hinders accountability? What are the things that create for a culture that lacks accountability.

In simple terms, here are some of the worst behaviors a leadership team or culture can take on, that directly discourage accountability. Do you recognize any of them? 

Politics: Any lack of alignment, trust issues or political maneuvering in the leadership team is easy to spot. As soon as these behaviors emerge in a leadership team, employees believe that outcomes will not be judged on their merits of effort and accountability, but that it is “who you know”, "who favors your", "whose side you are on", not “what you do” that makes you successful. Be sure to understand the complexity and evils of politics in your leadership team as this could be the single biggest threat to an accountable culture. You will blame your employees for a toxicity that you yourself have created.

My way or the highway: When your organization direction is based on top down decision making, where every idea or proposal needs to be approved at the top, or gets shot down or twisted back into being the single decision of a leader or leadership team, your employees will realize correctly they have no skin in the game, no contribution to offer and thus, they will lose a sense of accountability. How can one be accountable for work that you didn’t participate in designing or have any pride of ownership. It is the principle of buy-in and participation that drives healthy accountability..

Trust and safety: A project by Google to determine what made for the highest performing teams, identified after many months of research, that the ability to be vulnerable, to fully trust each other and to know you have safety if you mess up or ask for help, is the single best contributor to a high performing team.  When each team member has a strong sense of personal safety along with obligation to the team, to their outcomes and to the business, you will see accountability and success. If you have a lack of accountability across your organization you really must evaluate the levels of trust and safety at the leadership team and across your employee teams.

A sense of duty: When we are in a strong knit family or friendship group, when we volunteer together, we form strong relational bonds that bring with them a deep sense of obligation. The duty to not to let grandma down by forgetting to mow her lawn. The commitment to not let a friend in need go without help. The profound sense of duty to be at your kids school play on time, and the deep satisfaction created when you complete your volunteer project and see the benefit to others. This sense of family obligation makes the world a better place. Your teams need to have it among themselves. They cannot just be accountable to the leaders for fear of losing their jobs or getting their performance bonus. Their connections, friendship, support, bonds will drive an enormous and profound sense of accountability to each other. Work to ensure your teams and culture can build these profound connections.

We can’t change culture or people overnight. To introduce accountability to your culture should be part of a bigger culture project as these behaviors do not stand alone, and you need to understand the very unique reasons why accountability is a problem for your organization. First and foremost, your leadership team must have it, show it and not be afraid to be accountable too.

#change #anxiety