Your Relationship With Accountability

One very important factor to achieving success as a business owner is learning to take accountability for everything you do. Every one of us has our own strengths and weaknesses, and we need to recognize and claim them.

It can be difficult to admit to our weaknesses because they indicate failure at something. But even strengths must be considered in our overall accountability. We should all take a deep dive into ourselves, no matter how uncomfortable it may be. Identifying and employing your strengths can help you improve your performance. Truthfully owning up to your weaknesses and overcoming them can help your business be more successful.

Being accountable for yourself is key to improvement in your business. Most of us have encountered other business people who blame their mistakes and faults on others. If you don’t own up to your faults, it’s difficult to resolve them. If you take accountability for everything you do, good or bad, you can concentrate on improving yourself. If you just shove everything under the rug, nothing gets fixed.

As an example, let’s look at those business owners (and their employees) who don’t manage their email very well. They don’t organize email messages, don’t respond quickly or may not even read their email for a period of time. Since email has become the primary communication method between business people, ignoring incoming messages can be detrimental to your business. Those people who don’t keep up with their email often get upset when they miss an important email or can’t find one that they need. But getting upset does not resolve the problem. Taking accountability for their weakness puts them on the road to improving the situation. You have to recognize that there is a problem in order to take action on solving it.

Once you acknowledge your weakness, you will need to determine how critical it is to make adjustments. Email is a vital communication tool. If your inbox is not organized and properly attended to, you are going to miss important information, which likely will impact your business.

Here are a few tips for taking accountability and keeping focused on what’s most important:

1. If you have trouble managing and tracking your tasks and deadlines, there are tools that can help. Asana is one example of a task/project management tool that provides a clear picture of tasks and due dates. You can add contingencies, status, responsible parties and other details that can assist you in getting things done on time.
2. If your inbox is a mess, a program such as MailSTROM can help you get your inbox under control. Clean Email is another program that can help. If you don’t have the time or patience to learn and use these tools, you might want to consider hiring an assistant to organize and manage your inbox for you.
3. Are you easily distracted? If so, you’ll need to find a way to block any interruptions, especially when there are time constraints on tasks. Resist the urge to check the news reports, watch funny cat videos or have the TV on while working. You can set up a self-reward system, where you focus on completing a task, then allow yourself to check You Tube for a few minutes.
4. You can have an accountability partner to help you set goals and achieve them. The relationship between you and that partner must be totally transparent and based on honesty. Each of you must be truthful and upfront with each other to achieve the best results.
5. Planning ahead can help you meet your goals. However, if you do the analysis and discover that there is no way to make a set deadline, be honest with yourself and others who are affected. Nip it in the bud and address it sooner rather than later. Your customers may not take the news well, but they’ll take it even worse if they aren’t informed until the due date.

None of us is perfect; we all have certain strengths and weaknesses in our personal and professional lives. Being honest and taking accountability for them is the best way to overcome struggles. If you work with others, it is important to realize they, too, have their own strengths and weaknesses.

It’s important to find a way to work together and hold everyone accountable. Don’t pass the blame for your mistakes and don’t accept the blame for others’ mistakes. When the responsible party accepts their errors, everyone involved can move forward with remedying the problem.