Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
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Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
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Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#2This is focused on organizations but I will emphasize how moving from blame to accountability (or ownership) is a transformative stance for ourselves as individuals (as described in Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink). We often try to protect our egos by shifting blame, making excuses or just avoiding challenges altogether because blame and failure are such a negative experience. But instead of self-blame if you instead decide to take ownership, where you take responsibility for everything in your world, it becomes a kind of game of how you can level up to better master the world. You also focus on where you want to go and how to get there and stop beating yourself up for not being there already. Mistakes stop being so painful and instead become welcome gradient signals to level up. You start seeking out challenges to acquire more skills to get where you want to go.
Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#3This is focused on organizations but I will emphasize how moving from blame to accountability (or ownership) is a transformative stance for ourselves as individuals (as described in Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink). We often try to protect our egos by shifting blame, making excuses or just avoiding challenges altogether because blame and failure are such a negative experience. But instead of self-blame if you inst…
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Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#4It's both, there are definitely organisations where there is blaming.
But it's also very hard for individuals to not feel blamed when given feedback meant for improving the process.
Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#5This is focused on organizations but I will emphasize how moving from blame to accountability (or ownership) is a transformative stance for ourselves as individuals (as described in Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink). We often try to protect our egos by shifting blame, making excuses or just avoiding challenges altogether because blame and failure are such a negative experience. But instead of self-blame if you inst…
Ultimately, if you are "accountable" for everything in the world, then what you must do is establish control over everything in the world. Anything that cannot be controlled must be shackled and harnessed. Any independent behaviors by others must be extinguished; they must be turned into compliant automatons to be pushed this way or that by force. Nature also must be eliminated. It is illegible; you cannot understand or control it; it has to be paved over so that a Cartesian grid of parking spaces can be painted on it. Anyone who isn't you must be in chains.
Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#6I will take blame over accountability. Being accountable is a lot of work, that is rarely rewarded. And blame usually does not have any real consequences.
Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#7This is focused on organizations but I will emphasize how moving from blame to accountability (or ownership) is a transformative stance for ourselves as individuals (as described in Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink). We often try to protect our egos by shifting blame, making excuses or just avoiding challenges altogether because blame and failure are such a negative experience. But instead of self-blame if you inst…
Ultimately, if you are "accountable" for everything in the world, then what you must do is establish control over everything in the world. Anything that cannot be controlled must be shackled and harnessed. Any independent behaviors by others must be extinguished; they must be turned into compliant automatons to be pushed this way or that by force. Nature also must be eliminated. It is illegible; you cannot understand…
> Ultimately, if you are "accountable" for everything in the world, then what you must do is establish control over everything in the world.
This seems rather extreme. To me "accountable" means "accountable for your _reaction_" in this context. I don't think (or at least hope that) anybody advocating this stance is seeking to "eliminate nature" so much as accept it as it is and deal with it on a realistic basis.
As an illustrative example I ride motorcycles on the street. It is a fact of nature that people are going to try and merge into me or cut me off and threaten my life. Blaming them and being angry about it leads to poor outcomes in the form of aggressive and dangerous riding. Instead I focus on mitigating risk by wearing appropriate safety gear and anticipating bad drivers' actions so as to avoid it. I do not seek to control others so much as to maximize the value of my interaction with them by taking ownership of it.
Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#8This is focused on organizations but I will emphasize how moving from blame to accountability (or ownership) is a transformative stance for ourselves as individuals (as described in Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink). We often try to protect our egos by shifting blame, making excuses or just avoiding challenges altogether because blame and failure are such a negative experience. But instead of self-blame if you inst…
Ultimately, if you are "accountable" for everything in the world, then what you must do is establish control over everything in the world. Anything that cannot be controlled must be shackled and harnessed. Any independent behaviors by others must be extinguished; they must be turned into compliant automatons to be pushed this way or that by force. Nature also must be eliminated. It is illegible; you cannot understand…
Everything in your world. You decide on the system boundaries. If you haven’t already I’d recommend watching the accompanying TED talk
Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#9This is focused on organizations but I will emphasize how moving from blame to accountability (or ownership) is a transformative stance for ourselves as individuals (as described in Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink). We often try to protect our egos by shifting blame, making excuses or just avoiding challenges altogether because blame and failure are such a negative experience. But instead of self-blame if you inst…
Ultimately, if you are "accountable" for everything in the world, then what you must do is establish control over everything in the world. Anything that cannot be controlled must be shackled and harnessed. Any independent behaviors by others must be extinguished; they must be turned into compliant automatons to be pushed this way or that by force. Nature also must be eliminated. It is illegible; you cannot understand…
I take the bait: of course you can't control the weather. So you plan to hiking, so instead of getting soaked when it rains — you can pack an umbrella or a poncho.
So who's fault is it that you got wet? The weather? Was there nothing that could have been done?
Maybe it's your responsibility to plan for bad weather?
Re: Moving from Blame to Accountability (2017)
#10Quaint. Who's really blaming anyone these days? Vice-presidents maneuvering for power aren't trying to blame honestly in the first place, and the old-school bosses who'd call you into their office are retired by now. Modern organizations have Scrum Masters and Business Analysts with no disciplinary responsibility. In general, the appeal to universal truths on which to measure the individual is going out of style, and if you blame too much people will take it to Twitter or leave (exagerrating a little).
Workplace dysfunction (including the blame- and accountability issues from the article) is either coming from issues your boss knows about and can't fix, or considers acceptable, and either way you better work within the given constraints. Any solution about a griefing neighboring department will likely come through some tacit reorganizations when management reshuffles.
Not saying there is anything wrong in particular with the article, or that working through the article can't help if you truly want to reform a team; however such a task will require a manager with sufficient leadership skills and intuition about the true nature of an organization. Such a manager would better not put up powerpoint slides about the difference between blame and accountability at the end of the next daily standup. It's the intangible sprinkling of management magic that makes each team member feel understood and challenged to do better, and the diplomat's skill of negotiating a truce with the enemy within the company that no systems-thinking-article can teach.