The Ripples of Accountability
We frequently hear from CEOs, managers, founders, and sometimes investors about a lack of progress in their company for one reason or another. What they often point to is a lack of accountability within their organization as a root cause. They bring up the constant missed deadlines, the overshot projections, or failed production due to a range of problems. We can come up with corrective action plans to get these functions on track, however these plans can have a difficult time sticking if the CEO isn’t equally accountable. How in the world can you expect your team to be accountable if you’re not accountable as CEO or manager? It starts with you!
We often deal with leaders who overlook their own behavior while expecting others to work at a higher level than they work themselves. Often they equate long hours with meaningful, productive work. They think just the hours alone demonstrate personal accountability and an adherence to the values they want others to carry in the organization, when their work could be meaningless because of the values they unknowingly telegraph to everyone around them. Sometimes they subconsciously hire people with identical bad habits so they are not held accountable.
One CEO I know only hires people who he believes he can manipulate and they are the only people who remain at his company. He then complains that none of his employees can think on their own. Well, what do you expect? Of course his business has not grown in years, nor can it possibly grow. He built the culture that can’t grow the business.
We’ve all seen movies with super villains, and they alway have lots of bad people working under them. Ever notice that they all hold the same values? It’s not as if the super villain shoots someone in the face and the other henchman turn that super villain into the police. It’s the exact opposite! The other bad guys and gals start shooting right along with the super villain. You never see someone stand up in the organization and start talking about laws and morality and decency or even accountability. Their behavior blindly mimics the super villain. Their morality and values are aligned. We don’t question it in movies because we all believe it’s closer to human behavior. We never question the underlings following the super villain as something unrealistic. You can’t have a group robbing a bank unless they all agree with the morality of what they are doing in the first place.
This very same concept applies to CEOs who are not accountable to anyone. The next layer down is, of course, okay with the CEO’s lack of accountability, because, well, they don’t have to be accountable either. Besides, who’s going to step up and confront the CEO about his or her accountability? It’s the common values flowing down from the CEO. In movies, the super villain just shoots one of their own if they screw up or don’t exude the same values as him or her. Yet, the values still remain common among them and they all go along with the ruthlessness and never question the super villain. They mimic the behavior, good and bad.
In most cases, the individuals with values that differ from the CEO don’t bother to stay with the company, they find another job somewhere else where their values are more in line with their own. I know of one senior team that left a company because they thought the CEO was a slacker. They wanted to go somewhere that would add to their careers, not subtract.
I know of many people whose very careers centered on picking companies with common values. They picked the company because they believed in the CEO and everything they stood for. I have a lot of friends who are always on the lookout for that great CEO who’s building something big. They want to work with someone who can build opportunity with them. Furthermore, the weaker you are at producing results as a CEO, the harder it is to attract top talent. Great prospects can often spot weak opportunities and will avoid those companies.
When I see a CEO who claims to be holding a high standard of conduct for themselves, while everyone else is working at a less than optimum standard, to their frustration, I begin to doubt the CEO is aware of their own lack of accountability. One CEO we knew frequently complained about his overall team’s lack of progress yet that same CEO would take days, weeks, and sometimes months to make decisions others would make in a minute. Another talked about his company’s lack of results while that CEO rarely showed up for work! He assumed the company would run just fine without any leadership.
It’s a simple concept - if you want accountability, you too have to be accountable. Your failure could be because you’re a bad example and you may not even know it. Find someone to evaluate your role as CEO and give you the critical feedback you need to become a better CEO. Don’t just assume you have it down. Don’t surround yourself with sycophants and expect you to grow as a CEO. Your best guidance will come from those who are willing to point out behaviors that could get in your way.