There’s a vast difference between believing in accountability in theory and actually admitting fault in practice. The temptation to shift accountability can be overwhelming when oncoming stakeholders are moments away from fully blaming you for some failure or impactful mistake. It’s definitely a moment that calls for a leader to tap his or her inner hero to rise to the daunting occasion. But, the big payoff of standing on a principle of personal accountability in leadership has long been proven. Let’s consider the enormous consequences of not embracing leadership accountability and the even larger rewards of developing leadership competency in accepting accountability.

On the History of Leaders and Their Failures

All new leaders should be advised from the outset of their leadership careers that failures are inevitable. More importantly, leaders need to understand that failure is a necessary part of the business leadership learning process. Consider great leaders you’ve heard talk freely about their past failures, whether they’re failures of innovative attempts, of well-planned processes integrations, of major new product roll outs, or even of entirely new company launches.
Monumental failures are in the backgrounds of some, if not most of the world’s greatest business leaders. Successful leaders typically reflect on, and credit their failures with indispensable contributions to their knowledge. They will say that those failures and the resilience born from them shaped their futures and enabled their best ideas. They go on to rise up from their admitted failures and move toward their next challenge, with the new wealth of necessary learnings that become the seeds of their greatest achievements to come.
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So, the first action item for leaders looking to improve their record of personal accountability is to embrace the potential for failure in everything you do. Recognise that living with the potential for failure is the human condition. It even more profoundly defines the leadership condition, as that is a higher-risk condition, far more fraught with contingencies that can upheave the best laid plans.

Business Consequences of Leaders Not Accepting Accountability
The delicate structure of a workplace culture of accountability
can rather quickly deteriorate into a tense atmosphere of mistrust and self-defensiveness, when the organisation’s leader(s) demonstrate(s) unwillingness to maintain the level of leadership accountability that people need in order to be able to rely on them for honesty and fair treatment.

The business consequences of not accepting personal accountability include inadvertently promoting a workplace culture of non-accountability. Failure to accept accountability signals to all, a breach of personal integrity in company leadership. When the leadership integrity proves untrustworthy:

• People on staff who are most inclined to follow suit can be expected to feel free to deny accountability and shift blame for their own mistakes.
• The rest of the team will come to mistrust their situation.
• Ultimately, the most talented employees will defect, seeking a safer work environment.
• Those who stay on for their own reasons learn to keep their heads down and expect anything.
• Even people with the strongest personalities. who try to stay on board, become increasingly stressed by the untenable situation of trying to sustain employment in an unfair, unpredictable workplace. They finally grow weary of coping with its instability, and look for alternative employment.

Business Benefits of a Leader Accepting Accountability
A chain of the effects occurs on the thoughts and actions of everyone above and below on the hierarchy of authority, when a leader does, or does not accept accountability. Hence, one’s leadership future in a company and in an industry, and the atmospherics and financial success of a company are all driven by the perceptions of the character of the leader.

When good leaders demonstrate personal accountability, and foster a workplace culture of personal accountability, a wave of positive change sweeps through the organisation.
Team cohesion becomes stronger.

A stronger sense of employment security is instilled in workers.

Mutual trust is increased between workers, between workers and management, between management and external stakeholders, between company and vendors, and ultimately between company and customers.

Among all the interested parties, confidence in each other and in the company as an institution rises.

Personal performance pride, and pride in being a part of the company comes to characterise the team.

Greater pride in belonging to the company and increased support for its success develop.

The natural effects of greater teamwork, stronger sense of employment security, higher levels of trust and confidence in the company, and increased performance pride and company pride all contribute to improved individual and team performance, which altogether leads to:

• Higher rates of employee engagement, satisfaction and retention.
• Improved product and service quality.
• Increased customer satisfaction and retention.
• Increased profit margins.
• Strengthened reputation and brand.
• Increased growth rates.

How to Build a Workplace Culture of Accountability

All stakeholders, including employees, have an important economic interest in the success or failure of the company’s operational systems and processes. People are naturally eager to strive toward milestones that mark their stages of progress toward their goals, goals that include those they share with their team at work. People also always naturally want to do well as part of their social/work group, and they want to feel proud of their own behaviour and their group’s culture. So, developing a workplace culture of accountability is a process, not an impossible dream. Leadership Training Melbourne

With some encouragement, the average workplace can be elevated to one of exceptional pride in personal and group integrity, where people accept personal accountability as a badge of honour. The Harvard Business Review offers some great advice in ‘Accountable’. Here are some ways to promote this kind of exemplary company culture of accountability:

• Acknowledge how naturally difficult it is for humans to accept accountability, due to the sense of personal risk associated with admitting fault.
• Live an example of personal integrity, including acceptance of accountability.
• Set consistently clear expectations, before work begins on any project.
• Ensure that people are able to meet the expectations you set.
• Obtain acknowledgement of understanding of, and acceptance of your expectations.
• Recognise when it’s time to pass projects on to others, if it is beyond the ability of a struggling employee to succeed in it.
• Model accountability consistently for staff, contractors, and even for your superiors.
• Provide constructive criticism.
• Encourage creative problem solving, and ensure safe risk taking for innovation.
• Express appreciation, and reward accomplishments.
• Give objective feedback, and ask each team member what you can do to help them meet their goals.
• Modify objectives, processes, timelines, and assignments as needed to help ensure success.
• Delegate responsibilities, evaluate outcomes, celebrate successes, and work together with employees on performance issues.
• Empower employees, and make sure they understand that the more control they have over their work, the naturally greater their accountability becomes, and that that’s a good thing.
• Establish attainable benchmarks for progress and quality on tasks and projects, monitor progress, and provide needed coaching.
• Encourage employees to try their ideas for process and quality improvements, without fear of consequences for errors or failures of their improvement efforts.