Accountability
Content
Accountability
Accountability in the workplace is about doing what you say you'll do to fulfill the vision and mission of
your organization. When accountability is part of the work culture, the leadership strategy, and each
individual's personal philosophy, it's not an "imposition" on members of an organization. Accountability
isn't about blame or finger-pointing – it's about pride in ownership and the opportunity to share in the
company's leadership and success.
This program is designed to help you:
Differentiate between accountability and responsibility
Recognize the value of accountability in the workforce
Increase personal accountability
Provide leadership to promote accountability
Manage accountability challenges
Accountability in the Workplace
Why is accountability so important to businesses today? The most practical and business-critical reason
is that a lack of accountability costs money and eats into profitability. Employees are big investments
and a lack of accountability prevents them from performing to their full potential. A lack of
accountability in the workplace causes missed deadlines, defective products, inefficiency, and poor
working relationships.
What does it take to create an accountable organization? Like many desired business practices, it
starts at the top. There are several things the leaders of a company can do to create an accountable
organization:
Define the business context and provide a guiding, purposeful direction.
Engage organizational members by providing forums for them to share suggestions, ideas, and
best practices.
Hold people accountable, especially those at the head of departments and work units.
Give individuals and teams the authority to achieve the results they are accountable for.
Ensure that company structures, procedures, and processes facilitate efforts to be accountable and
carry out work assignments and commitments.
The role of leadership in creating an accountable workplace is more about being accountable for
directing, empowering, and facilitating others – and less about micromanaging or doing the job
yourself.
Responsibility, Accountability, and Empowerment
Responsibility is being charged with carrying out certain tasks.
Accountability relates to being charged with ensuring that certain outcomes are achieved.
Empowerment comes along with accountability. When people are encouraged to be accountable,
you build empowerment.
1
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
The Accountable Person
Often in business, people feel the need to protect themselves by being defensive and deflecting blame.
Negativity is often their first instinctive reaction during times of stress. Negative remarks are the polar
opposite of the types of remarks made by individuals who practice personal accountability, and they
yield the opposite results.
The good news is, when you hear someone being negative or are tempted to be negative yourself, you
have a choice. You can take the opportunity to use a positive tone and be personally accountable in
your comments and questions.
Examples of personally accountable questions include
How can I help?
How can we fix the problem?
How can I support the team?
Being accountable means that you want to be part of the solution. You want to accept responsibility for
changing or improving the situation at hand.
In the QuickTalk, Choose Your Attitude, Allison Rimm shares an example of how two different
employees expressed accountability, or lack thereof, through personal choices and attitude and the
way that small acts of accountability can have large impacts on others.
Positive Personal Accountability
People who practice personal accountability usually stand out in an organization. Personal
accountability goes beyond being "individually" accountable for one's own area of responsibility.
If you're an accountable person, you'll display certain distinguishing characteristics that define how you
relate to others in the organization:
Take responsibility for setting your own goals.
Align and map your values and goals with those of the organization.
Plan the impact of your work on others.
Answer for the success or failure of your own work.
When you are personally accountable, you accept responsibility and take action. You see yourself as
part of the solution.
Aligning Values and Goals with Those of the Organization
Do you see your work as contributing to your personal goals? Do you see your work as a contribution
toward your organization's goals? When you align your values, motivations, and goals with those of
your organization, the bond between you and your organization gets stronger and you develop a
greater sense of personal accountability.
2
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
There are three steps to aligning your values to that of the organization:
List and describe your work preferences. Imagining an ideal job, a job that would be a perfect
fit for you, is one way to explore your work preferences. You may also describe what you like about
your current job. Many kinds of work values motivate people to take work seriously and make a
genuine effort to do a good job. These values include accomplishment, competition, helping
society, creativity, recognition, problem solving, and team work.
List the values practiced by your organization. You can identify these values by what your
company spends time and money on. An investment of time or money is evidence of the values
practiced by an organization.
Map the alignment of personal and organizational values. When you compare a list of your
personal values with a list of the values practiced by your organization, you will find some areas of
alignment, obligation, opportunity, or conflict. You can map the alignment of personal values and
organizational values to help you find how your motivating work values can help you take
accountability for your work results.
Planning the Impact of Your Work on Others
When you apply your own values to the way you do your job, you need a clear plan. An accountability
plan includes three elements:
The first element of an accountability plan is a specific proposed contribution to the
organization. A contribution may be something tangible such as a report, a piece of equipment, a
product, or a financial gain. It may also be something intangible such as information, shared
knowledge, or training for other organization members. Whether your proposed contribution is
tangible or intangible, it should be something specific that results from your work and that can be
readily measured or counted.
The second element of an accountability plan is a set of metrics for measuring success or failure.
A success metric clearly describes the conditions of success from your contribution in terms that
can be observed and then measured.
The third element in your accountability plan is a defined limit to the contribution. If you don't
set clear limits, taking on more responsibilities may encourage supervisors or coworkers to keep
raising their expectations. Clearly describe the last step in the contribution you'll make, or spell out
what's not included in your proposed contribution.
Practicing personal accountability requires careful thought and planning. The three elements of an
accountability plan allow you to choose what you will contribute, how you will measure your success,
and how you will set limits on your contribution to avoid misunderstandings.
Answer for the Success or Failure of Your Own Work
As an accountable person, you have to answer for your successes and failures, and outline your plan
for the future. There are three steps to an accountability self-assessment:
1. Claim credit for your successes. Restate what you set out to accomplish in just a few words,
and then describe what you've accomplished. Examples include, "I completed my report on time,"
or "I performed 11 of the 15 tests successfully."
2. Accept responsibility for your shortcomings. Describe goals that you failed to achieve or
where no significant progress was made. Examples include, "I did not send my report to all of the
executives on the distribution list," or "I failed to perform 4 of the 15 tests."
3. Outline your plans for the future. Explain how you'll address shortcomings, any proposed
changes in goals, timelines, or activities, and how these changes will affect the organization.
3
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
If you follow the three steps for presenting an accountability self-assessment correctly, you can tell
your story clearly and exercise some control over the conversation.
Tips for Becoming a More Accountable Person
Today's leaders don't have time to look over their employees' shoulders. They need people who will do
the job right the first time. In addition, the workplace has expanded globally and virtually, and work
assignments are not always visible. Employees and managers must trust that work will be
accomplished, often without visible evidence or when others are absent.
If you want to increase your personal accountability, there are some do's and don'ts:
Do know how your contributions fit into the big picture. Don't just "do what you are told" without
knowing how your work meets company and customer needs.
Do actively look for ways to make improvements or increase productivity. Don't wait until you are
asked to do so.
Do exercise sound judgment when faced with decisions. Make the right call by considering issues
from the customer perspective, or even the perspective of your team or manager. Don't avoid
making a decision that could benefit your company.
Do correct mistakes even when they are not your fault. Focus on solving the problem. After solving
a problem, identify what went wrong so that similar situations can be avoided. Don't point fingers
at others.
Do be honest when you make a mistake and come prepared with a solution. Don't hide problems
or try to cover them up.
Do work with what you have when you cannot find an immediate solution. Don't use the lack of or
poor resources as an excuse.
Do keep in mind the chain of accountability and how your contributions and mistakes impact
others. Lend a hand to others. Don't take actions that serve only you and/or your part of the
business.
In business today, lack of personal accountability is a serious, ongoing problem. It has resulted in a
culture of blame, complaining, and procrastination. No organization or individual can achieve its goals,
compete in the marketplace, fulfill its vision, or develop people and teams without personal
accountability.
The Accountable Leader
It's much easier to hold people accountable for their work if they know what's expected, and more
importantly, why it's expected. This will pay off in increased employee commitment, not to mention
increased profitability. The other major payoff here is the opportunity to do some soul searching. How
accountable are you? Take the chance to consider your own performance as a manager and practice
your own approach for ensuring accountability.
Members of the workplace need leadership in order to be accountable. They also need leaders who
demonstrate personal accountability in their own roles.
Vision and Direction
Accountable leaders have a clear sense of direction and purpose. They know what their organization
needs and they have a plan to get there. They communicate their vision with enthusiasm and passion
that is inspirational for the employees they lead.
4
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
Accountable leaders are responsible for setting and communicating the direction for employee goals.
Having a vision for the future gives a goal meaning. Once established, meeting goals requires followthrough and persistence.
Awareness in Self and Others
What can you do to demonstrate your awareness as a leader? First, understand people – the role they
play, what motivates them, and how they like to work. There are several things to remember:
The behavior of leadership strongly affects people.
People commit to their own ideas, and naturally resist the ideas of others.
People help those who help them.
There is power in numbers, so tap into your group's energy, creativity, and collective knowledge.
People will rise to meet your expectations if the expectations are clearly defined.
In the QuickTalk, Using Vulnerability to Increase Mutual Accountability, Peter Fuda illustrates how
awareness of your limitations provides an opportunity to create accountability within the organization,
and the positive outcomes that can result.
Just as your employees are accountable to you, you are accountable to your employees. Be aware of
how you treat your employees, and take action to let them know you respect and support them. Be the
manager your people need, and they will serve you well.
Delegation and Follow Through
By delegating tasks to your employees, you can help them become more knowledgeable and more
confident. But before you can hand off assignments to your employees, you must make sure they have
the tools and training necessary to perform the tasks.
As employees develop competence in performing tasks, they also develop confidence in their abilities.
When both the confidence and the competence are present, they are ready to move to the next level
of learning.
Not all tasks or assignments require this level of detail, and some employees need more support than
others. If you are wondering about giving too much or too little information or support, invite the
employee to let you know how much information to give.
Facilitate Team Ownership and Accountability
As a leader, there are ways you can promote a sense of responsibility and accountability among team
members:
Involve the team in setting goals. Members who participate in creating goals will be more
inclined to view those goals as their own.
Involve the team in diagnosing and solving problems. Participants feel more responsible for
problems that they own as a team.
Validate team members. Leaders validate team members by affirming or complimenting them
on specific actions, attitudes, or ideas that contribute to team goals. This creates a positive feeling
in the team.
Leaders who validate their team in the process of setting goals, diagnosing problems, and working
together on solutions increase the effectiveness of team work and promote a sense accountability and
ownership among its members.
5
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
Addressing Accountability Problems
When your company, your team, or one of your team members has a problem, you as the manager
need to determine accountability. In other words, you need to get to the cause of the problem.
However, this is not always as easy as it sounds, since often there are many layers to problems, and
you have to peel back the layers to discover the root cause.
Individual accountability issues
When you discuss a problem with a staff member, keep in mind that your goal is to identify the
problem quickly, and then redirect the employee to get him back on the right track. Be sensitive as you
seek to identify the root causes of the employee's problem, and make sure the employee knows that
you want to help. Once you've identified the problem, you may want to restate and clarify
expectations, help determine a solution, and then set check-ins to monitor progress as the employee
seeks to set the problem right.
Team accountability issues
Identifying accountability issues within the team can be more difficult. Meet with the team to discuss
the problem. Be careful not to assign blame. State the problem, open discussion, and listen carefully to
what your employees tell you. To determine accountability issues within teams, you should:
Brainstorm solutions.
Ask open-ended questions.
Ask "why" five times to dig down to the root cause of the issue.
Mediate team conflicts.
If the problem is created by an organizational issue, then remove the obstacles or barriers that are
impeding progress. It's important to understand what, if any, obstacles exist that are not within the
control of the individual or the team.
Summary
Companies need to build a culture of accountability to protect the significant investments made in
people, leaders, teams, and most of all – the loyalty of their customers.
The desire for accountability in the workplace has grown alongside the expectations for business
performance. Accountability is essential, especially in today's business environment where people are
working in virtual teams on multiple, fast-moving projects.
6
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
Accountability in the workplace is about doing what you say you'll do to fulfill the vision and mission of
your organization. When accountability is part of the work culture, the leadership strategy, and each
individual's personal philosophy, it's not an "imposition" on members of an organization. Accountability
isn't about blame or finger-pointing – it's about pride in ownership and the opportunity to share in the
company's leadership and success.
This program is designed to help you:
Differentiate between accountability and responsibility
Recognize the value of accountability in the workforce
Increase personal accountability
Provide leadership to promote accountability
Manage accountability challenges
Accountability in the Workplace
Why is accountability so important to businesses today? The most practical and business-critical reason
is that a lack of accountability costs money and eats into profitability. Employees are big investments
and a lack of accountability prevents them from performing to their full potential. A lack of
accountability in the workplace causes missed deadlines, defective products, inefficiency, and poor
working relationships.
What does it take to create an accountable organization? Like many desired business practices, it
starts at the top. There are several things the leaders of a company can do to create an accountable
organization:
Define the business context and provide a guiding, purposeful direction.
Engage organizational members by providing forums for them to share suggestions, ideas, and
best practices.
Hold people accountable, especially those at the head of departments and work units.
Give individuals and teams the authority to achieve the results they are accountable for.
Ensure that company structures, procedures, and processes facilitate efforts to be accountable and
carry out work assignments and commitments.
The role of leadership in creating an accountable workplace is more about being accountable for
directing, empowering, and facilitating others – and less about micromanaging or doing the job
yourself.
Responsibility, Accountability, and Empowerment
Responsibility is being charged with carrying out certain tasks.
Accountability relates to being charged with ensuring that certain outcomes are achieved.
Empowerment comes along with accountability. When people are encouraged to be accountable,
you build empowerment.
1
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
The Accountable Person
Often in business, people feel the need to protect themselves by being defensive and deflecting blame.
Negativity is often their first instinctive reaction during times of stress. Negative remarks are the polar
opposite of the types of remarks made by individuals who practice personal accountability, and they
yield the opposite results.
The good news is, when you hear someone being negative or are tempted to be negative yourself, you
have a choice. You can take the opportunity to use a positive tone and be personally accountable in
your comments and questions.
Examples of personally accountable questions include
How can I help?
How can we fix the problem?
How can I support the team?
Being accountable means that you want to be part of the solution. You want to accept responsibility for
changing or improving the situation at hand.
In the QuickTalk, Choose Your Attitude, Allison Rimm shares an example of how two different
employees expressed accountability, or lack thereof, through personal choices and attitude and the
way that small acts of accountability can have large impacts on others.
Positive Personal Accountability
People who practice personal accountability usually stand out in an organization. Personal
accountability goes beyond being "individually" accountable for one's own area of responsibility.
If you're an accountable person, you'll display certain distinguishing characteristics that define how you
relate to others in the organization:
Take responsibility for setting your own goals.
Align and map your values and goals with those of the organization.
Plan the impact of your work on others.
Answer for the success or failure of your own work.
When you are personally accountable, you accept responsibility and take action. You see yourself as
part of the solution.
Aligning Values and Goals with Those of the Organization
Do you see your work as contributing to your personal goals? Do you see your work as a contribution
toward your organization's goals? When you align your values, motivations, and goals with those of
your organization, the bond between you and your organization gets stronger and you develop a
greater sense of personal accountability.
2
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
There are three steps to aligning your values to that of the organization:
List and describe your work preferences. Imagining an ideal job, a job that would be a perfect
fit for you, is one way to explore your work preferences. You may also describe what you like about
your current job. Many kinds of work values motivate people to take work seriously and make a
genuine effort to do a good job. These values include accomplishment, competition, helping
society, creativity, recognition, problem solving, and team work.
List the values practiced by your organization. You can identify these values by what your
company spends time and money on. An investment of time or money is evidence of the values
practiced by an organization.
Map the alignment of personal and organizational values. When you compare a list of your
personal values with a list of the values practiced by your organization, you will find some areas of
alignment, obligation, opportunity, or conflict. You can map the alignment of personal values and
organizational values to help you find how your motivating work values can help you take
accountability for your work results.
Planning the Impact of Your Work on Others
When you apply your own values to the way you do your job, you need a clear plan. An accountability
plan includes three elements:
The first element of an accountability plan is a specific proposed contribution to the
organization. A contribution may be something tangible such as a report, a piece of equipment, a
product, or a financial gain. It may also be something intangible such as information, shared
knowledge, or training for other organization members. Whether your proposed contribution is
tangible or intangible, it should be something specific that results from your work and that can be
readily measured or counted.
The second element of an accountability plan is a set of metrics for measuring success or failure.
A success metric clearly describes the conditions of success from your contribution in terms that
can be observed and then measured.
The third element in your accountability plan is a defined limit to the contribution. If you don't
set clear limits, taking on more responsibilities may encourage supervisors or coworkers to keep
raising their expectations. Clearly describe the last step in the contribution you'll make, or spell out
what's not included in your proposed contribution.
Practicing personal accountability requires careful thought and planning. The three elements of an
accountability plan allow you to choose what you will contribute, how you will measure your success,
and how you will set limits on your contribution to avoid misunderstandings.
Answer for the Success or Failure of Your Own Work
As an accountable person, you have to answer for your successes and failures, and outline your plan
for the future. There are three steps to an accountability self-assessment:
1. Claim credit for your successes. Restate what you set out to accomplish in just a few words,
and then describe what you've accomplished. Examples include, "I completed my report on time,"
or "I performed 11 of the 15 tests successfully."
2. Accept responsibility for your shortcomings. Describe goals that you failed to achieve or
where no significant progress was made. Examples include, "I did not send my report to all of the
executives on the distribution list," or "I failed to perform 4 of the 15 tests."
3. Outline your plans for the future. Explain how you'll address shortcomings, any proposed
changes in goals, timelines, or activities, and how these changes will affect the organization.
3
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
If you follow the three steps for presenting an accountability self-assessment correctly, you can tell
your story clearly and exercise some control over the conversation.
Tips for Becoming a More Accountable Person
Today's leaders don't have time to look over their employees' shoulders. They need people who will do
the job right the first time. In addition, the workplace has expanded globally and virtually, and work
assignments are not always visible. Employees and managers must trust that work will be
accomplished, often without visible evidence or when others are absent.
If you want to increase your personal accountability, there are some do's and don'ts:
Do know how your contributions fit into the big picture. Don't just "do what you are told" without
knowing how your work meets company and customer needs.
Do actively look for ways to make improvements or increase productivity. Don't wait until you are
asked to do so.
Do exercise sound judgment when faced with decisions. Make the right call by considering issues
from the customer perspective, or even the perspective of your team or manager. Don't avoid
making a decision that could benefit your company.
Do correct mistakes even when they are not your fault. Focus on solving the problem. After solving
a problem, identify what went wrong so that similar situations can be avoided. Don't point fingers
at others.
Do be honest when you make a mistake and come prepared with a solution. Don't hide problems
or try to cover them up.
Do work with what you have when you cannot find an immediate solution. Don't use the lack of or
poor resources as an excuse.
Do keep in mind the chain of accountability and how your contributions and mistakes impact
others. Lend a hand to others. Don't take actions that serve only you and/or your part of the
business.
In business today, lack of personal accountability is a serious, ongoing problem. It has resulted in a
culture of blame, complaining, and procrastination. No organization or individual can achieve its goals,
compete in the marketplace, fulfill its vision, or develop people and teams without personal
accountability.
The Accountable Leader
It's much easier to hold people accountable for their work if they know what's expected, and more
importantly, why it's expected. This will pay off in increased employee commitment, not to mention
increased profitability. The other major payoff here is the opportunity to do some soul searching. How
accountable are you? Take the chance to consider your own performance as a manager and practice
your own approach for ensuring accountability.
Members of the workplace need leadership in order to be accountable. They also need leaders who
demonstrate personal accountability in their own roles.
Vision and Direction
Accountable leaders have a clear sense of direction and purpose. They know what their organization
needs and they have a plan to get there. They communicate their vision with enthusiasm and passion
that is inspirational for the employees they lead.
4
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
Accountable leaders are responsible for setting and communicating the direction for employee goals.
Having a vision for the future gives a goal meaning. Once established, meeting goals requires followthrough and persistence.
Awareness in Self and Others
What can you do to demonstrate your awareness as a leader? First, understand people – the role they
play, what motivates them, and how they like to work. There are several things to remember:
The behavior of leadership strongly affects people.
People commit to their own ideas, and naturally resist the ideas of others.
People help those who help them.
There is power in numbers, so tap into your group's energy, creativity, and collective knowledge.
People will rise to meet your expectations if the expectations are clearly defined.
In the QuickTalk, Using Vulnerability to Increase Mutual Accountability, Peter Fuda illustrates how
awareness of your limitations provides an opportunity to create accountability within the organization,
and the positive outcomes that can result.
Just as your employees are accountable to you, you are accountable to your employees. Be aware of
how you treat your employees, and take action to let them know you respect and support them. Be the
manager your people need, and they will serve you well.
Delegation and Follow Through
By delegating tasks to your employees, you can help them become more knowledgeable and more
confident. But before you can hand off assignments to your employees, you must make sure they have
the tools and training necessary to perform the tasks.
As employees develop competence in performing tasks, they also develop confidence in their abilities.
When both the confidence and the competence are present, they are ready to move to the next level
of learning.
Not all tasks or assignments require this level of detail, and some employees need more support than
others. If you are wondering about giving too much or too little information or support, invite the
employee to let you know how much information to give.
Facilitate Team Ownership and Accountability
As a leader, there are ways you can promote a sense of responsibility and accountability among team
members:
Involve the team in setting goals. Members who participate in creating goals will be more
inclined to view those goals as their own.
Involve the team in diagnosing and solving problems. Participants feel more responsible for
problems that they own as a team.
Validate team members. Leaders validate team members by affirming or complimenting them
on specific actions, attitudes, or ideas that contribute to team goals. This creates a positive feeling
in the team.
Leaders who validate their team in the process of setting goals, diagnosing problems, and working
together on solutions increase the effectiveness of team work and promote a sense accountability and
ownership among its members.
5
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
Addressing Accountability Problems
When your company, your team, or one of your team members has a problem, you as the manager
need to determine accountability. In other words, you need to get to the cause of the problem.
However, this is not always as easy as it sounds, since often there are many layers to problems, and
you have to peel back the layers to discover the root cause.
Individual accountability issues
When you discuss a problem with a staff member, keep in mind that your goal is to identify the
problem quickly, and then redirect the employee to get him back on the right track. Be sensitive as you
seek to identify the root causes of the employee's problem, and make sure the employee knows that
you want to help. Once you've identified the problem, you may want to restate and clarify
expectations, help determine a solution, and then set check-ins to monitor progress as the employee
seeks to set the problem right.
Team accountability issues
Identifying accountability issues within the team can be more difficult. Meet with the team to discuss
the problem. Be careful not to assign blame. State the problem, open discussion, and listen carefully to
what your employees tell you. To determine accountability issues within teams, you should:
Brainstorm solutions.
Ask open-ended questions.
Ask "why" five times to dig down to the root cause of the issue.
Mediate team conflicts.
If the problem is created by an organizational issue, then remove the obstacles or barriers that are
impeding progress. It's important to understand what, if any, obstacles exist that are not within the
control of the individual or the team.
Summary
Companies need to build a culture of accountability to protect the significant investments made in
people, leaders, teams, and most of all – the loyalty of their customers.
The desire for accountability in the workplace has grown alongside the expectations for business
performance. Accountability is essential, especially in today's business environment where people are
working in virtual teams on multiple, fast-moving projects.
6
© 2016 SkillSoft Ireland Limited
