Accountability and Blame - they don't go together

Accountability – every business wants it in their culture. We watch politicians on TV and hear the repeating drum beat of desired accountability. But, when we say we want these things what do we really mean?

For my HR and manager friends – let’s get gross misconduct off the table. That’s not what we are talking about. Obvious misconduct cases are usually terrible situations, but let’s face it – easy to deal with as long as someone has the backbone to deliver the consequences. But, the vast majority of issues in life and work are not gross misconduct. It is simply that we have not lived up to an expectation or commitment.

Accountability is a condition of responsibility. When we make a commitment, take a job, set a goal or objective – we have just made a choice to be obligated to do, to be, or to deliver something. The pop culture buzz phrase has become “owning it”. You’ve got to “own it”. We have to own our behaviors and the role we play in the system.

We don’t hear about accountability in the positive context enough. But, it is logical that if one were to be held accountable for negative actions, one will be held accountable for positive actions. This is the tension and part of the issue with engagement. It is the gap between a management mindset and a contributor mindset. I want my positive contributions to be accounted for (at least thanked) and the management system more often references accounting for the negative.

It’s all in the delivery right? “Ya, I”m ownin’ it”. Pride, strength, accomplishment. Or, “you need to own your shit”. Mistakes, low-self awareness, negative patterns, and letdowns.

Owning it – when you are responsible you own up to your action, or inaction, toward an expectation. Your friends expect you to be courteous and you aren’t – you have to own up to that. Your manager expects for you to hit a goal and you don’t – you have to own up to that. You go public and admit your faults. But, the more crucial part of owning it isn’t admitting it – it is fixing it so you don’t repeat. Yes, you didn’t hit goal. But, what will you do differently next time? What system will you put in to place to change? Now your commitment isn’t merely to do better next time, it is to set a plan to make sure the deficiency is handled. So many people are forgiving of a one-time situation, but patterns that repeat turn into relationship issues where people don’t forgive and more importantly stop trusting. When you own it you take charge of yourself, you set goals, you seek help and feedback, and you put plan Plan B in place. People who really “own it” or demonstrate a lot of self-accountability are usually highly self-aware. Self-awareness is, on one hand, simple – you either got it or you don’t. On the other hand, it is a complex process to develop it and another topic entirely.

Blame. You can’t have an accountability culture if you have a blame culture. If it is the nature of people to point fingers, that’s not taking accountability. The distinction is between excuses and reasons. Reasons are logical points. Reasons are the result of an inquiry about the issue with direction for change. Excuses are superficial observations not usually accompanied with a fix. Excuses are prominent when there is a pattern of letdowns. It can become a survival mechanism. Most importantly, if leadership is accustomed to blame, it hinders inquiry, obstructs vulnerably, and sets a behavioral standard that blaming others is okay, tacitly approved, or even encouraged.

In blame cultures, it becomes hard to fail – ever. If you are afraid to fail, the big risk is that you will be afraid to try something new, something better. There are praiseworthy failures and innovative, disruptive, challenger companies get comfortable with a spectrum of failure. There are times to learn from mistakes. There is no place for blame.

Blame comes from and leads to fear. If you are afraid, the instinctual response is to get defensive, blame, or go quiet. You deflect when you are afraid. As a leader, this is a big deal, because you may never know the root cause of the issue. Objective observations get lost in the emotion of fear.

Consequences. When we hear “he’s got to be held accountable for that!”. It often means we want to see him experience a consequence for his action. She didn’t meet her goal, so what is the consequence? If she’s accountable, she’s completed her inquiry, set a new plan in place and has made a new commitment. This is often enough – the point is to create a path to solid performance and mistakes are often, and arguably should be, a part of the path. We learn a lot from mistakes. There will always be a consequence – sometimes they just take a long time to come around. It is the gravity of the consequence that needs to be considered. When someone is in deep self-criticism, externally imposed consequences may not be necessary. The key is … will it repeat or be fixed? Only time will tell.

The other end of the spectrum is when we see executives, let’s just use financial institutions as an example, create a culture of cheating and they still get golden parachutes. Is the public shaming enough of a consequence? Consequences are part of accountability, but they are a separate consideration. We need to talk about each to have an effective discussion.

What can you do?

Partner in performance – work on creating goals together. You may have a sales goal dictated by business needs, but what do you need to hit that goal? What are the possible obstacles? What is your forecast? Great managers and management systems start with great goal setting experiences. More conversationally – it is what is expected of me, what support/knowledge/autonomy do I need to meet that expectation, what is my scoreboard, and what communication should we have to stay in touch about progress? Don’t let over-complicated goal setting/keeping systems get in the way of getting great work done.
Partner in performance X 10 – when teams can co-develop goals it is even better. You get the meta-goal and each team members agrees to his or her commitments to it. They then agree on how they will track and communicate progress. This community commitment is far more powerful than entering a goal on a worksheet or internet tracker. When you do this I am making a commitment to you. It’s more personal.
Get out of the tech. I’ll be the first to admit that I LOVE gadgets, apps, and internet magic. But, when we bury our commitments under technology it becomes a second thought. Entering and tracking them is part of measuring the progress of the business, but don’t leave it there. Print out the goals/commitments. Post them where others can see them. Let your team know. Take a pic/snip and post it on your work-profile. Business transparency is a big deal – this includes our commitments together to build a better business.
Shut down blame. Move to solutions. Seriously, just shut it down. Don’t let people triangulate issues or each other. Teach people to be solvers and fixers. Work is so incredibly collaborative, it is rare that a significant error can be placed at one person’s feet. What happened in the system? What could we have done to prevent it? What can we do better together next time?
Issue consequences. If it is a pattern of poor performance you need to deal with it. That’s not accountability. That’s management. If you have set expectations time after time, worked on solutions and continue to see the same pattern – deal with it. Wrong person, wrong job? Wrong system, right person? Wrong job, right person? Wrong system, wrong solutions, wrong tools, wrong questions? There will always be consequences that emerge from poor performance and it’s good to deal with them. Not dealing with them is tacit approval to the person and the entire team that low performance is okay. In critical situations, the consequences will happen at some point and it will be worse.

To drive an accountability culture you need healthy teams where people can be vulnerable with each other. Accountability cultures are full of systems thinkers who are looking at the system first for improvement and setting individual goals within the system. Good team members ask for advice and ideas proactively. Accountability cultures don’t have feedback fatigue where everyone offers an opinion resulting in overload. They have healthy connections and feel comfortable using each other to produce great work.

The cheat sheet: