Accountability is one of those principles of business that is an vital foundation of organizational culture however is easily shrugged off as a buzz-word. Ask someone in your organization to outline accountability, and you will hear any variety of answers, from "I do not know" to "following the rules." You may even see some eyes roll.
Accountability is never explicitly outlined, whether for the organization as a full, or for the departments and teams that work among them. Whereas a well-designed performance management system may hint at the underlying accountability philosophy, rarely does a corporation outline the daily act of accountability, even for its leadership team for whom it's most important.
What's accountability? A quick search at Dictionary.com reveals the subsequent definition: "ac?count?a?bil?i?ty [uh-koun-tuh-bil-i-tee]: the state of being accountable, liable, or answerable." Certainly, it's an understandable answer to the question , but it will not shed a lot of light-weight on what it means that for individuals in organizations to be accountable.
Intuitively, everybody incorporates a sense of what accountability means that to them. A warehouse clerk is accountable for correct components inventory each month. A person's resources director is in control of ensuring the corporate heeds employment laws. A CEO is in charge of business results. For every of these examples, the word "accountable" could be replaced by "responsible." Each person is responsible for achieving a result.
However, accountability suggests that a lot of than responsibility. There is a way that alternative individuals are involved. The identical CEO is accountable to shareholders. The warehouse clerk is accountable to his manager. The human resources director is accountable to the employees. Accountability needs that someone encompasses a stake in whether or not or not the desired result is achieved.
Of course, the one that is responsible for the result conjointly should have a stake in achieving the outcome. There must be a consequence - positive or negative - based on whether or not or not the end result is achieved.
The basic definition of accountability, then is: Accountability is a promise to yourself and others to deliver specific, defined results, with consequences.
The process for assigning accountability asks four questions. Answer the questions at intervals the following guidelines.
In control of what?
Accountability starts with an outcome, a result that needs to be accomplished. It is necessary to tell apart between responsibility for activities and accountability for results. Micro-managers define the activities that are expected and then hold workers responsible for performing those activities. However, accountability for results requires space for judgment and call-making. Someone cannot be in command of an finish result if somebody else tells him what to try to to and how to do it. Ultimately, it's the top result that forms the expectation upon which accountability is based.
Who is accountable?
Next, assign who holds the responsibility for the result. Ultimately, accountability is not shared. A manager who has taken on responsibility for a result may delegate that responsibility to an employee, but the manager will not offer up the accountability for that result, nor does she really share the accountability with that employee, since they are accountable to totally different people.
Accountable to whom?
Everyone is accountable first to himself. The result must be achieved among the scope of 1's own personal values, ethics and abilities. Establish the party or parties who have a stake in the outcome. If there is a lot of than one stakeholder, determine if the expected outcomes are the same. If the expectations are totally different, then an agreement ought to be made between the stakeholders on how those outcomes are related.
What are the consequences?
Accountability is meaningless without consequences, positive or negative. The concept of holding someone accountable comes in here. If somebody accomplishes the results they promised to realize, then he should be recognized for that. If somebody misses his target, then he ought to at best not receive the popularity, and at worst he ought to be penalized. It is vital to define the consequence up front.
Accountability is not conditional. Accepting unconditional responsibility means there aren't any excuses and no one answerable, even if events are beyond one's control. Additionally, accountability for results suggests that activities don't seem to be enough. It is not enough to execute activities perfectly if the specified outcome isn't achieved. If people receive the expected reward for trying onerous, then accountability can not work. If the organization needs to reward risk-taking or making an attempt laborious, then it should be done outside of the initial accountability agreement.
How accountability is assigned and followed up in your organization defines how results-oriented your organization is. Explicitly defining accountability and setting clear pointers for holding individuals accountable will go a protracted manner toward achieving results.
Author Resource:
Jeff Patterson has been writing articles online for nearly 2 years now. Not only does this author specialize in Accounting, you can also check out his latest website about
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