What’s Your Accountability Style?

Where do you fall on the Accountability Style continuum? Most of us lean to one extreme or the other, making the classic mistakes of either forcing things to happen (Coerce & Compel) or taking too little action to follow up (Wait & See). Consider the strengths and weakness of each extreme:

“Coerce & Compel” strengths are: Takes action and steps in when things go wrong, exercises persistence in follow-up, doesn’t give up easily, ensures frequent and regular reporting, communicates high expectations, and stays focused on the task at hand. Weakness associated with this extreme include: Intimidates others, overreacts to bad news, tends to force things to happen, willingly sacrifices relationships, resists a people-oriented approach, and lacks sufficient trust in others.

“Wait & See” strengths are: Strongly supports people, emphasizes giving people freedom to succeed or fail, places a lot of trust in others, steps in with great caution, builds strong loyalty and support in others, and thoroughly thinks through intervention before acting. The weaknesses of this extreme are: Avoids a proactive approach, strikes people as disengaged, makes false assumptions that things are happening, does not follow up often enough, tends to err on the side of not intervening, and sets low expectations.

Now consider the following two examples. First, a successful entrepreneur, we’ll refer to him as “John,” demonstrated all the qualities of the Wait & See style: a strong people orientation, lots of trust, and a preference to allow freedom, plus a hesitancy to step in too quickly. However, people in the organization did not think John was holding his international marketing VP, “Robert,” accountable. People in the organization believed Robert was independent, self-interested, difficult to work with, and aloof. They saw John as letting Robert run wild. Eventually, Rob­ert was allowed to move his international marketing team to Brazil, where he maintained his independent, self-interested approach to getting things done while John continued to let things happen. It later came to light that Robert was using company resources to conduct third-party manufacturing and marketing with his buddies in Brazil for their own personal gain. Of course, John felt personally violated. The trust he’d placed in Robert had been destroyed.

The second example is also an entrepreneur, we’ll call her “Joan,” who launched a start-up in the software development industry. Joan built her success on a belief that she was usually the smartest, most committed member of the team, engaging in whatever work needed doing. She never hesitated to ignore the chain of command, marching into anyone’s office at anytime to make sure projects were on schedule and problems were being solved. She was famous for questioning anyone on any topic in an effort to get results. That approach seemed to work flawlessly, until, in the wake of a merger, she inherited a larger organization from a successful but slower-moving company. Ever forceful and impatient, Joan acted precipitously to move people out of the way and force the organization into a faster operational mode. People in the acquired organization saw Joan as a “Tornado” that always left a trail of dead or mangled bodies in its wake. Not surprisingly, Joan quickly replaced the old culture with an environment of fear, where people hesitated to try anything new. With all decision-making firmly under her control, people’s motivation and loyalty sank to an all-time low. The company made some progress toward its objectives, but only at a snail’s pace.

Both entrepreneurs, each with a different style reflecting two extremes on the continuum, were hindered by style weaknesses that affected their abilities to hold others accountable. Acknowledging and understanding your Accountability Style can help place you at a more optimal point on the continuum. We call this point the “Positive, Principled Way” and consider it to be a per­fect blend of strengths from both accountability styles, which, of course, mitigates the weaknesses of each extreme. Visit our Web site at https://www.partnersinleadership.com to assess your current Accountability Style more accurately.