You better be accountable in 2016
Keith Bestwick
Published at
We have seen numerous change management approaches emerge and be adopted by OPEX programmes over the last fifteen years. We have seen Cotter, Cap and Prince. My research into the change management field also shows me that we have now entered the era of EQ/NLP/organisational accountability and other psychoanalytical approaches that really harness the often undervalued asset of people.
Sustainability is the old chestnut that comes back time and time again. Was the project a success? Well, it is going ok at the moment, buts let’s see what happens over the next 12 months and we see that 7 out of 10 times the expected financial impact of a change program is not sustained past year one due to a failure in execution.
Excuses for being unaccountable
On the topic of sustainability I often hear Six Sigma deployment and/or project failures hide behind the equation y = f(x) with the argument that “We are just not ready to go that deep with our data” and Lean deployment failures hide behind the pre-requisite “cultural change” and the argument that “We are not Japan in the 1900’s”. It would actually be refreshing to hear something like “We as a leadership have been stuck in our own paradigms for far too long, we have irrational fears in our own ability to make a breakthrough in performance and we failed to create the environment to allow our people to grow into a position of accountability and take performance levels to a new normal”.
So how do we get there?
Accountability – true organisational level accountability – is one which fosters a common desired outcome, a true picture of success that calibrates every action that is taken every day in the direction of hitting your goals, whatever they maybe. It is not a corporate mission statement or strategic vision, it is simply a picture of success. OK, great so what – I hear you ask – is this thing called accountability? Well let’s be absolutely clear. It is all about behaviour, and with that it’s about the differentiation of accountable behaviour and victim behaviour. And it is the fundamental role of leadership today to create the environment that allows accountable behaviours to flourish.
Company culture & accountable behavior
Once accountability is embraced within your organisation then you don’t heed to hide behind your culture because you will see, hear and feel what you want to within your business. Action is then taken in an accountable way that takes you towards your desired outcomes. At R&G, we define accountability as the obligation of an individual or (part of) organisation to account for its activities in order to contribute to the desired outcome, accept the related responsibility for them and to disclose the results in a transparent manner.
So, be clear on your desired outcome, create an environment for accountability to flourish and keep on moving towards your goals.
Keith Bestwick is partner of R&G Global Consultants in the United Kingdom.
