Proactive Accountability: Shifting Your Mindset

Accountability: anything or anyone that helps us gain mental leverage to achieve the results we desire. —The Accountability Stop

A young engineer started at our office recently. Unlike other new hires, he’s been at my desk almost daily asking how he can help me and how he can get involved. Other new hires have been content to just work through software training exercises and wait for real work to be assigned to them. This particular engineer’s proactivity and eagerness won me over quickly; I got him involved in one of my projects. We’ve made site visits together and I’m assigning him design tasks to do on his own.

It got me thinking again about proactivity as it relates to accountability. We talked about the carrot and stick versions of accountability. My suggestion was that planning for accountability is better than anticipating (usually dreading) accountability in the future. What if we look at accountability as taking the wheel on our goals, instead of reacting to other’s demands for accountability? If we build accountability into our own process from the start, we stand a much better chance of achieving our goal.

Seeking Accountability

Our new engineer isn’t waiting for accountability to find him. He’s actively looking for it. He asks to be engaged and accountable for real project outcomes. In addition, he’s demonstrated technical competence. He seems poised to leapfrog over others in the company.

In my own life, I need physical therapy for my elbows. I’m supposed to stretch several times per day. I told my workout coach about this as well. He began to ask me how I was doing with physical therapy. In a way, I was irritated by his checking in. It struck me as nagging. But I realized he just wanted to keep me accountable. So I started reporting my physical therapy proactively each day with my comments on my workout. I don’t always do all my daily stretches, but I’ve shifted my thinking so I’m tracking my physical therapy activity, instead of reacting to questions from my coach.

Don’t Wait for the Question to Be Asked

Last week I mentioned weekly check-ins with my accountability buddy. I copy my list of priorities in several places to encourage myself to make progress before our meetings. When we meet, we run through our priorities and report on how we’ve done. We don’t wait for the other to ask how our projects are going. Even if we haven’t made progress, we’re proactive in reporting that. We don’t wait to be asked, “did you work on that project of yours?”

I also keep a written list of tasks at the office. (I’ve tried various electronic task lists, but none of them are as effective as pen and paper for me.) That list is also part of my proactive accountability. I’m not interested in having someone else in the office or a client call to remind me of something I need to do. I rewrite my tasks on my new task list (every two days I rewrite it), which prompts me to take care of them before I get called out by someone else.

What if, instead of waiting for the boss to come bother us about our work, we decide when we’re going to send an update (ahead of when the boss usually wants it) and proactively say what we’ve done and what’s left? What if someone reporting to us were to do that? Personally, I find that kind of proactivity to be responsible and accountable. It makes me feel more confident to give that person more work and greater responsibility. 

What’s Your Account?

Are you proactive with your accountability? Or are you reactive, waiting for others to remind you of what you said you would do?