Accountability is About Results – Not Punishment

Image by ecastro via Flickr

For some reason accountability has gotten a bad reputation in this society. When the word is used, many of us tend to have flashbacks to being sent to the principal’s office to be held “accountable” for our actions — which of course only happens when the actions are deemed unacceptable.

Our entire school experience is based upon a punitive use of accountability. We are given assignments and are graded on our performance when they are due. When we are younger, our parents often bug us during the interim to see how we are doing and whether we are making progress. The older we get though, we learn that, in college, it’s our responsibility – no one will be there to prod us along. And our grades, at the end are used to hold us accountable – to reward or punish us for the quality of our performance.

No wonder, as adults, we run for the hills every time someone mentions the word accountability. We are grown now so why should we subject ourselves to the same parental/teacher/principal type of treatment from our youth? We rebelled as teenagers so we continue to rebel now.

This traditional way of viewing accountability is in fact juvenile. The more useful, more adult way of viewing accountability is as a tool that supports results. When we view it as merely the acceptance of punishment for our action, rebellious tendencies cause us to act as victims blaming everyone and everything we can think of for our actions or the results we get. When we move out of this victim mentality and accept responsibility for ourselves, our thoughts, our feelings, our beliefs, our actions, and our results, we can embrace accountability as a tool to help us succeed.

The best accountability systems include several elements:

• Clearly defined objective(s) or goal(s)
• A way to recognize when success has been achieved
• An action plan with clear steps that should lead to success
• Interim milestones that provide an indication of progress towards the goal
• Support from someone else, an accountability partner, who will challenge you to stay on track

Use accountability at the beginning of the process to help you achieve results, not as a punish or reward at the end and you just might be surprise to find that you are routinely succeeding in ways you might not have ever imagined.

Have a powerful day!

Cecilia