The Personal-Leadership Accountability Link
You can’t really talk about leadership accountability without talking about another kind of accountability. And that kind of accountability is personal, literally speaking, because what we’re talking about is personal accountability.
What is personal accountability, and how is it different from leadership accountability? On a high level, accountability itself is the proactive experience of taking responsibility for your actions. Leadership accountability includes everything you do to take responsibility for your actions tied to leadership. And personal accountability is, no surprise, is how you take responsibility for your personal actions.
But let’s be real. The greatest, most effective leaders aren’t just strong accountability leaders but individuals who excel at personal accountability. And personal accountability, which is always a work-in-progress effort (no matter how amazing you are as a leader), is foundational to leadership accountability. They’re naturally linked.
For instance, think about the last time you heard about a respected CEO who suddenly made a serious personal mistake that then completely undermined this leader’s credibility and the trust the teams and clients/customers had for that leader. It happens all the time, sadly. The headlines are a dime a dozen.
And another thing that happens, but is often less likely to make the news, is that leaders often struggle to uphold even the most basic of healthy habits, such as work-life balance, because they don’t use accountability to set personal goals, stay on track, hit targets and continually advance against those goals. This, too, can have devastating and destructive impact over time on not just the leader’s personal life, but the leader’s professional life as well—specifically, the leadership itself, the teams around that leader, and the company culture and customers that eventually experience and perhaps even suffer from those impacts.
As a leader, it’s important to sustain personal accountability. This means setting vital goals that challenge and inspire growth, as well as establishing controls that guide and drive that accountability experience by measuring progress, enabling honest feedback and insight (maybe with executive coaching) around that progress, and tapping tools and resources, such as a personal accountability system, to fuel appropriate, forward-focused action toward those goals.
At MAP, we are dedicated to helping leaders understand the importance of accountability in the workplace and leadership. But it’s got to happen on a personal level as well, and we are skilled at helping leaders identify blind spots, challenges and, most importantly, opportunities to really grow personal accountability with a system that works. It’s part of our customized leadership development.
Want to improve your leadership accountability? Let’s simultaneously advance your personal accountability with our proven way to achieve breakthrough results. Learn how—Contact MAP today!
