"Productive insight; clear (often sudden)
understanding of a complex situation." Free Dictionary
Pop the bubble of conditioned
thinking and emerge into the creative realm of "no absolutes," continuous
change, uncertainty and unlimited possibilities.
Then, there can be innovation,
adaptation and optimal performance.
Performance & Open-minded Mindfulness:
Open-minded: questioning everything,
accepting diversity and uncertainty.
Mindful: consciously aware; concentrated.
Foundation for blending process, project,
engagement and knowledge management into a cohesive approach to optimize
performance.
This Newsletter
Our aim is to stimulate the kind of thinking, dialogue and understanding that leads to optimal performance.
Accountability is having to own up to one's responsibility, to give an accounting and be open to the consequences of one's behavior. Consequences are what happen when there is an action of any kind - every action has some consequence. The consequences can be positive, negative or neutral. Neutral consequences are of no consequence. (I couldn't resist the play on wordsJ). Consequences can be experienced by the person responsible for the action or by others or both.
In the world of projects and organizations there is often resistance to accountability even in the face of a strong push to optimize performance. People like praise but not to be held accountable for negative actions.
In the broader sense we are, as individuals, responsible for our actions. We have a responsibility to make sure that what we do causes no harm and that if possible we create positive outcomes. When we do err, we can be mindful of it and of the feelings that arise as a result and then decide to do our best to remedy whatever harm we may have caused and to not make the same error again.
If we take this to heart we have no problem with accountability. It is only when we are caught up in denial and in a false sense of identification with a self image that can do no wrong that we have a problem with it.
Why Is Accountability a Problem?
One of the reasons is that our situations are so complex that it is virtually impossible to isolate one person or group's work to sufficiently enable meaningful accountability. We can measure the effectiveness of a process but it is hard to attribute performance success or shortfalls to individuals. As an individual we can know that what we have done was positive or not. In the organizational settings it is clear that we have to answer to others.
For example, who is accountable for an accident caused by a product design flaw that causes injury to someone who uses the product? A designer may have purposefully omitted a small feature from a product design to keep the cost down, a reviewer caught the omission and questioned whether it could cause problems but his manager told him that it would be better if he didn't look into it too deeply because it was a minor thing and that they were all being measured on the cost effectiveness of the product. The auditor from a regulatory agency was so over burdened that he never caught the omission. Or, maybe his agency was run by people who were from the industry it was regulating and "understood" the need to keep costs down.
Who is responsible for the failure of a nuclear reactor caused by the maintenance organization changing the constraint on the thickness of pipes carrying cooling water to avoid having to replace the pipes until the pipes become so thin that they can no longer withstand the water pressure? Is it the maintenance organization or the regulators who let it happen or the legislators who are more interested in protecting the power company's profits than in protecting the lives of their constituents or is it the constituents who elected the legislators?
Is the project manager responsible for project failure when the client insists upon unrealistic objectives and threatens to find someone who can do it when confronted with pushback?
The Broken Chain of Accountability
Unfortunately, the chain of accountability becomes broken and while everyone has been part of the cause no one is really accountable for their part in any meaningful way. The excuse is that the system is so complex that no one is at fault. Sometimes the chief executive takes responsibility, but more often than not that is just lip service and nothing changes.
When there is no accountability there is little opportunity for learning and the problem, error or omission is repeated.
Depending on the situation, the results can be disastrous.
So What to Do?
To begin to resolve this issue we need to look to the way people have been conditioned to deal with poor performance. The first impulse is often to hide the truth. "Don't say anything about it and it will go away" is one tactic. Another is to shift the blame to someone or something else.
Why? Because people fear blame and punishment. They do not want to be punished and they know that punishment is the most likely consequence of owning up to an error. In some cases they are so perfectionistic that they cannot admit to themselves that they made an error.
Can we change the standard response from blame to forgiveness, cause analysis and process change and/or retraining? If we do that it can change people's attitudes about making errors so that they become more willing to bring them to light.
That by itself may be idealistic.
So, we couple it with effective monitoring and control that identifies problems as they occur or even before they occur. We make sure the system is as fool proof as possible and that it doesn't permit the kind of tinkering that allows some issues to be overlooked.
Then we acknowledge that there are some people who either just don't care or do not have the capacity to do what they are expected to do or who are motivated by greed for money or power. When appropriate we apply action to relieve them of their duties and/or subject them to punitive damages.
If we want ourselves, our organizations, countries, relationships, etc. to perform well, then we need to make sure that there is transparency - people accountable for their actions and the consequences of those actions.
