Hardwiring Accountability

Something is happening within many of the organizations.

And it’s troubling.

There are many incredibly sincere and well-intentioned managers. Supervisors whose need to be “nice” exceeds their organizational mandate for accountability. Leaders whose need to be liked inhibits them from acting upon their responsibility to establish, or maintain effective boundaries of accountability.

They are unwilling or unskilled at taking tough action required to maintain discipline or safeguard standards of conduct for clients, vendors and “owner” employees within the organization itself.

There are those who insist that others be accountable and end-up being judged as too harsh or hard-nosed. This situation shows up organizationally as low morale, poor quality, customer or employee retention problems, higher costs and deadlines missed and missed again.

Given only one choice (okay, so it is a forced dichotomy) which quality would you want in a manager? Ms./Mr. Nice or Mr./Ms. Accountable?

Where is Nebraska? It is due north of Dorthy’s home, and the “Wizard of Oz.”

And what a wonderful place it is.

People really care about each other in Nebraska.

Those providing service, be it in a grocery story or an attorney’s office really (no kidding) take the time necessary to genuinely listen. In Nebraska folks behave in ways that show they care about you. Doing business is more than just a transaction–it is about nurturing a relationship.

Organizations across the United States need more people with a “Nebraska Attitude.” People who really care and show it. Hi Mom

During these difficult economic times everyone is feeling pressured. The climate within most workplaces is far from relaxed. This tension leads to an intensification of behaviors for toxic bosses — the yellers & screamers, control-freak micro managers, insecure nightmares. Here are some steps you can take to cope the problem manager:

1. Don’t take it personally! Do not let toxic people penetrate your self esteem. Their screaming, demeaning, cynical poison is about them, not you. Consciously manage your boundaries so the toxins can’t get in.
2. Remain flexible, yet don’t compromise your values in the face of other people’s toxic emotions. It’s surprisingly easy to slip into resentment, sabotage, vindictiveness or the temptation to get revenge. When this happens, you become part of the problem - so monitor your reactions carefully.
3. Resist acting victimized by the tyrants around you. Tyrants feed on victims. Victims can not lead. Be proactive and act on your personal power and resilience.

All these steps take a hefty dose of self-control. Yet they’re certainly better than the alternatives–having your passion and creativity at work be extinguished.

Have you been the recipient of poor service lately? If you haven’t you are clearly an exception…congratulations. I’ve been honored to work with many conscientious leaders who know how hard it is to earn loyal customers; and, how easy it is to lose them due to poor employee attitudes and organizational snafus. One of the reoccurring challenges many of our clients face is hiring the right people with the right “service” attitude. Not skills…attitude. Skills can be taught…attitude is much deeper, complex and difficult to change.Once people with a caring disposition are onboarded, the next step is to orient and train staff with the skills that will make a competitive difference for your business. Standards of conduct, scripts for critical points during a transaction and service recovery responses all need to be implemented to create a culture of service in organization.Here are 3 things you need to build a culture of service:

1. Focus on Service Excellence—Get others passionate about measuring excellence and building a legion of raving and loyal employees who will “live these values” with customers

2. Focus on Leadership Action—Implement practical leadership tools that help connect-the-dots for employees empower them to deliver what they know is excellence and winning service to customers

3. Focus on Accountability Systems—Hardwire proven methods to create more employee ownership and alignment with company’s goals

Creating a culture of service is more than platitudes from management about the importance of “customer service,” followed by skills and drills training. Creating a service culture is about timeless values and mindsets of caring lived first with staff who pass this “internal state” on to customers.

Overhead on the streets of New York City:
Panhandler:
“Do you have any change?”
Passerby:
“Change starts within.”

Yes, change starts from within and so does entitlement. I’ve had it with entitlement. I’ve had it with anyone, of any generation, regardless of age, with an entitlement mentality.  It you want it, make it happen for yourself. Stop relying on the boss, mom & dad or others to lift you up…if they do you are lucky…if they don’t do it yourself through persistence, sweat equity and good ole fashion hard work.

There remains an abundant amount of opportunity to enterprising and self motivated professionals at any age. (Attention-shameless self-serving link: Knowing Point Partnership.) What it takes is focus,  openness to learning, loyalty and an unrelenting attitude of Carpe Diem (seize the day).

If you deserve more, which you do; and, you want more, it is yours for effort transformed into results that matter…you just have go for it. Just don’t expect opportunity to be waiting on the  silver platter passed at the next networking event. Go and make it happen for yourself. Stop singing the entitlement blues. You’ll feel better for it.

Over the years, I’ve had the pleasure of connecting with many highly skilled professionals eager to leave the corporate rat-race and have more control and a better lifestyle coaching, training or consulting to organization’s in the organization development/effectiveness space.

Many of these talented and currently employed folks are looking to make the leap by arranging a smooth landing into a new career with minimal disruption to the income they have become accustom. Not impossible. Bless them.

I’ve also met as many individuals, if not more, who have already taken the leap into their entrepreneurial journey only to have significantly underestimated the time and resources needed to be successful as a sole-practitioner. Some are “unconsciously incompetent” in terms what it really takes to be successful in their own business, others hang on to hope until the very last drop of savings before seeking help or “rescue” by stepping, once again onto the gerbil-wheel of corporate exercise.

To succeed in your own business requires more, and different, skills than are required to be a player on the inside of an organization.  To be successful in today’s consulting, training or coaching market requires teamwork, collaboration, branding and an element of luck. (For those interested in special opportunity check out Knowing Point Partnership.)

Here’s my advice to those seeking greener pastures, the lucrativeness, freedom and lifestyle of being on the other side of the desk: Take careful measure of trying to do it on your own. In addition to a competent skill set, anyone venturing into this field needs to understand how to generate qualified leads and how have powerful conversations about their work that gets them invited “to the dance.”

If you have the passion, persistence and skills to be successful as a consultant, trainer or coach seek out and join an experienced team and avoid risking precious time and money reinventing the wheel. Don’t wait too long to affiliate.

From my experience, most strategic alliances and teaming done in the OD/OE space are temporary coalitions and suffer from a lack of commitment to building a company and brand that creates a durable and sustaining organization. In addition, two downsides of strategic alliances are equity and governance issues. Who owns the intellectual property of the alliance? What equity is being build that can eventually be sold? How are important decisions made in service of growing the entity so that lasting value is being built. Not just per diem or “subject matter” experts bank accounts being enhanced? 

What most independents yearn for, in my opinion, is to be part of a team and have colleagues with whom they are not competing with to be able to learn, share, coach and be coached and grow professionally. It is fairly easy to go out secure work and have a job. It is more challenging to be part of an organization and be committed to growing it and being rewarded from its ongoing success.

Most sole practitioners need more lead development. While it remains a reality that we as professionals are primarily responsible for generating our own business, it is important to explore business models and structures where incentives exist to refer business to others and to team-up in the delivery of work. A community where it’s to every team member’s mutual advantage to support the other in both business development and practice development.

After years of trying strategic alliances these models have come up short as a solution for long term teaming in the OD/OE space. In my opinion and experience, without real commitment and skin-in-the-game, strategic alliances are a shallow model for teaming in the long run. Check out our alternative to strategic alliances: Knowing Point Partnership.

Recently Paul Brown at the New York Times wrote an article describing how failure isn’t always bad. No one is naturally good at everything they do all the time. In order to get better at anything in life, you have to continuously work at it. That means accepting that failure is part of life. It is how you deal with that failure that is important. Once you are faced with failure, you have two options, you can give up or you can persevere and continue on until you reach your goals. No one ever said it was going to be easy. When it’s something you have a real passion for and want to succeed at, you realize that all the failure and effort you put in is worth it in the end when you overcome your hurdles and actually achieve your goals. This is true both personally and professionally.

In life we have to take risks and try new things. That may mean not always being the best at something the first time around. That doesn’t mean that you give up and stop trying though. In order to succeed, one must be determined and not let a little failure become discouraging and prevent you from pursuing your goals. Anything really worth having in life takes hard work, persistence and determination. Often times that entails accepting failure before success. We tend to learn our most valuable lessons when we fail and have to try again at something. If we never took risks because we were scared of failure, we could miss out on amazing opportunities!

How do you build a culture of accountability?

To start we need to define accountability? To some, it’s something you make people do, as in making people accountable. Trying to “make” people do anything is a long term recipe for creative subversion. There are few systems known to humankind that can not be “worked around.” Ironically, accountability is lessened when mandated.

Be definition, accountability is being answerable or responsible for something. Well planned and implemented accountability systems actually open the door to ownership–where other’s acknowledge they’re responsible for some aspect of the organization.

Accountability is not something you “make” people do. It has to be chosen, accepted or agreed upon by people within your organization. People must “buy into” being accountable and responsible. For many, this is a new, unfamiliar, and sometimes, uncomfortable way to work.

To learn to be accountable means coming to grips with discipline. Accountability is the opposite of permissiveness and vagueness is its enemy. Holding people accountable is really about choice and responsibility. When people have more choice, they are more responsible. When they become more responsible, they can have more freedom. When they are more accountable, they understand their role and contribution within the organization and are committed to making things happen.

So, how do you build a culture of accountability?

The first step is to make sure your are attracting and then inspiring people who want to be accountable. The next step is to create simple measures and goals from the top of the organization to the bottom–measures drive accountability. Now you have a solid chance of having sustainable success through a culture of accountability.

Kelly Spors over at the Wall Street Journal recently wrote an article focusing on the importance of development plans for employees. Development plans are a great way to help employees realize you are focused on helping them achieve their goals. This leads to your employees feeling more valued and makes them less likely to seek employment elsewhere.

In today’s competitive market, it’s important to keep key employees at your organization. You can help them achieve their professional goals by assisting with their personalized development plan. This may mean sending them to additional training programs or assisting them with enrolling in classes to advance their basic knowledge in an area they are interested in eventually working in. Development plans should never be mandatory. It is simply a way to help your employees outline what they need to do to achieve their goals in a specific timeline. Your employees will feel more valued because they will realize your organization is taking a real interest in helping them progress and achieve their goals.