and gentlemen, your next CEO!” A collective gasp went out as Jim's peers were shocked. “What! Why? Because he said he failed? Okay, well I failed before,” one of his coworkers responded.
The CEO explained, “No. That's not why. It's because six months ago, when we first came together, I handed each of you a boiled seed. None of you should have been able to grow a plant from the seed I gave you. Jim was the only one who chose to do the right thing even if it cost him a promotion. That's the kind of person I want to lead this organization.”
When you sow honesty with accountability, you will reap prosperity.
Many leaders cite a lack of accountability among their staff members and direct reports as a key issue affecting their organization. Poor accountability is often triggered by lack of clear expectations and roles. As the leader, it is your responsibility to communicate roles and desired outcomes. Help others accept responsibility by communicating with them, not to them.
How Do You Ensure Accountability?
Start by answering these questions. Do all projects and initiatives have:
● A goal – what does winning look like?
● One clear owner?
● A project plan with dates, deliverables, and a point person for each deliverable?
● A standard check-in process for deliverables?
Holding yourself accountable as the leader can help you achieve results besides demonstrating your integrity. Aanya, the manager of accounts of a leading biochemical organization in India, faced a difficult tax-compliance challenge that required responsible leadership and accountability from the whole team to overcome the challenge together.
Due to a significant oversight by Aanya's tax collection department, nobody had collected a required interstate tax form from clients. Out of compliance with Indian law, her organization was facing a threat of exposure to crores rupees (effectively millions of dollars) in sales tax payments. Recognizing that it had been her responsibility to make sure her team had been collecting those forms, Aanya knew she had to own the problem and make significant changes to fix the issue to mitigate the financial impact.
Accountability by the leader, in this example, exposes the complex process often needed to correct errors. In other words, being accountable is much more than accepting fault. Accountable leadership includes making right whatever may have been wrong.
Aanya started by gathering all the information she needed about the problem. She assembled the tax forms that had not yet been completed and assessed the potential financial loss that would occur if the forms remained undone. Immediately, she worked with her team to identify form submission deadlines expected by the Indian Revenue Service.
Modeling accountability, Aanya worked intensely with her team to correct the situation. Everybody, Anybody, Somebody, and Nobody, figuratively speaking, were excused from the room, and the whole team began to work feverishly together. Aanya united the team by painting a clear and accurate picture of the issue and empowered the team to participate in designing the process that would be needed to resolve the issue. They in turn became accountable and created urgency to meet the deadline imposed by the Indian Revenue Service.
First, they organized a project plan. Next, Aanya personally alerted her director about the issue and her culpability. Although he, of course, was not at all happy that the team had put the organization in this position, the director cooperated in resolving the error. Aanya committed to take full responsibility for the situation and showed the director the team's new plan. Consulting the director, she decided on setting the goal to collect at least 95 percent of the forms needed before the 3-month deadline. She also set an interim milestone goal to collect at least 50 percent of the forms from her top client list within the first 45 days.
Aanya also called a meeting with others in the organization to bring attention to the issue, present the plan to collect the forms, and assign tasks to responsible parties. Learning from the mistake, she also set up weekly accountability meetings with her management team to ensure project progress and completion in the future.
As planned and because of the responsible actions of Aanya and her team, they collected the missing forms worth over $1.4 million in tax liability!
Every leader can learn or relearn a lesson from this example. Accountability starts with you. Don't attempt to delegate accountability to deflect blame from yourself. Leaders with integrity will shoulder responsibility, fix the issues, and implement processes to prevent future mishaps. Although individuals on Aanya's team had neglected collecting the forms from clients, she had assumed responsibility as the department head once the issue surfaced. Those who may have caused the error were also included in developing and delivering the solution.
Decision Making
Driving the achievement of goals is also facilitated by well-thought-out decisions. When your decisions align with your values and your team is included in the decision-making process, achieving results becomes a shared set of goals.
Leaders make decisions daily, although some decisions are certainly larger than others. Leaders who make smart decisions in the open may at the same time be demonstrating to team members how to make good decisions themselves, especially in ways that may affect business opportunities in the future.
Do you consult others when you make decisions? Do you seek perspectives from your team? Or, do you decide alone? The way you approach a decision may depend on the nature of specific situations. Monetary decisions, organizational decisions, corrective decisions, and a variety of other resolutions might be handled very differently with each type of decision. Irrespective of the type of decision, ethical leaders are careful and intentional to not deceive, blame, or run afoul of promises made to others.
“When your values are clear to you, making decisions becomes easier.” The quote, attributed to Roy Disney, nephew to Walt and longtime executive at the Walt Disney Company, links values to decision making. Leaders who drive for results find ways to link their organization's values with the major and minor decisions made every day.
When the values of your organization are understood and followed, making the right decisions and creating buy-in from your employees are typically easier. Whenever possible, everyone ought to know why the decision was made, not because of rules, regulations, policies, and procedures but because the decision is aligned with the values that guide them. Values answer the question of how you go about doing business. They answer how organizations should manufacture products, deliver services, market themselves, and treat customers – and also how managers treat employees.
Miguel, a senior manager in a medical products manufacturing organization in the Dominican Republic, was tasked to lead a major $25.5 million cost-reduction project at his manufacturing plant. Faced with significant cost-cutting demands, he decided to act collaboratively with those on his team. From past experience, he felt that a slash-and-burn approach to cutting costs was not effective or sustainable. Miguel determined to make decisions with high team engagement and involvement. The first decision he made was aligning the project plan with the values of the organization. He also understood that he needed a strong team of cross-functional leaders, leaders who could communicate the need for the changes and help guide the organization through completion of the plan.
In consideration of the talented people on his team, Miguel intended to retain employees and looked for ways to upgrade the skills and capabilities of his managers so that they might contribute in decisions that would affect the whole organization. In this instance, a leadership development course addressed a longer-term plan. Situations like Miguel's predicament may require immediate action, as well as decisions to grow the capacity or skills necessary
