Leaders Need to be Accountable Too

Are you building trust with your team?

As a leader, at any level, if you’re not accountable to every single person in your organization, you’re missing the mark.

Effective leaders capitalize on all potential opportunities to demonstrate what it means to be accountable. Little things, big things, doesn’t matter. Be the example that sets the tone for the organization.

This is important - because it creates trust. Being anything less than accountable directly erodes the perception of your reliability.

People notice, so stop blocking yourself from being fully effective.

If you’ve spent more than thirty seconds thinking that you’re too busy to be accountable to a teammate, you’ve likely screwed this up.

Challenge: Spend fifteen minutes writing down the names of people that you have not responded to, or for which you’ve missed a commitment in the last ninety days. Then ponder for another fifteen minutes what the impact might have been for that person. Then elevate your perspective to the impact on the broader organization.

What did you find? Frightening isn’t it?

Having completed the exercise, if you find yourself regretting missed opportunities, confront that conflict by directly admitting the misstep with the impacted teammate(s). See what happens next; we bet it’s positive and adds value for your business. Sure, you don’t have time for everything. But be accountable and say so, with specific reasons - that’s another opportunity to lead.

Pachydermos, LLC helps key players in organizations recognize such opportunities and commit themselves to behavioral shifts that drive effective leadership.

Leading by example is one of the foundations of the Pachydermos practice. Robert Stoneking recently had the opportunity to join Brian Thomas, CTO at Coruzant Technologies for a podcast to discuss, ”Mastering Change and Cultivating Trust”. We encourage you to take 8 minutes out of your day to give it a listen and comment below with your thoughts and questions.

Listen to the podcast: https://coruzant.com/profiles/bob-stoneking/

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