Strategic Discipline Blog

In Get Greater Accountability, Individual Meetings or Team Meetings? I failed to outline some of the more positive outcomes that come from group meetings and individual meetings.  Let’s look also at private and public accountability and why the latter works so much better in group meetings.

Every case with a team can be different. In a cohesive team accountability is best called upon in team meetings. Everyone learns when leaders and members of the team call on one another on issues in front of the team member; they get benefits that don’t occur when it takes place individually.  One of the most important understandings that often require time and patience, is your leadership team needs to value this team above all others.  Inexperienced leadership may not recognize the importance of company priorities versus departmental priorities.

Here are Three Reasons where Group Meetings do better at Accountability (Patrick Lencioni):

1. When members of a team demand accountabilities during a meeting, everyone receives the message simultaneously.  Accountability is expected and you will be called on to Success Criteria for yours each week.  No one else should ever have to make the same mistake twice of not being prepared.    This saves time; no one has to learn the same lesson again.   Groom your leadership team with your DNA.   
2. All team members know that the leader is holding everyone to their accountabilities, which avoids them from wondering if the boss is doing their job or not.  This reinforces the culture of accountability. It increases accountability.
3. Finally, it serves to reinforce the culture of accountability, which increases the likelihood that team members will do the same for one another. When leaders—and peers—limit their accountability discussions to private conversations, they leave people wondering whether those discussions are happening. This often leads to unproductive hallway conversations and conjecture about who knows what about whom.

It’s worth pointing out here that people often confuse accountability with conflict because both involve discomfort and emotion. There is an enormous difference between the two. Conflict is about issues and ideas.  Accountability is about performance and behavior. As difficult as it is for many people to engage in conflict, at least it is somewhat objective, removed from a person’s behavior. It is much harder for most people to hold one another accountable because it involves something of a personal, behavioral judgment

Individual one on one meeting can have these benefits:

1. At the E-Myth we called these weekly mentoring meetings.  We had an agenda and intention for what the meetings would bring. Coaching would include discovering more about who the person is their talents, desires, what motivates them. Discovering how their talent fits.  Ultimately this leads to a deep relationship with employees especially if they discovered and worked through their Primary Aim.
2. Another positive of the one on one is it tells the employee for that ½ hour to an hour, you’ve decided to make them the most important person in your world.  I loved mentoring sales people, reviewing their presentations, what they could have said or should said to help them improve.  I can honestly say with this kind of individual attention you’re people should improve or you have the wrong people on the bus. 
3. Drawback to individual mentoring meetings is time.  If you manage any more that 4-5 people each day each week is going to be spent in a mentoring meeting. That’s a lot of time eaten by meeting especially if your ultimate goal is accountability.  You may want to do a monthly mentoring meeting, or more with new people, but getting people to be accountable takes place best in group meeting.

Hope you find these helpful in gaining accountability traction within your organization.  Since this is my first blog since Tuesday, July 3^rd you may have assumed things were a little rough the past week.  They’ve been a bit up and down.  Monday and Tuesday I felt I’d fully recovered from my lung infection but by Wednesday I was feeling worse.  I’m doing much better and the doctors are confident I’ll recover.  The good news is I making some White Blood Cells on my own, (up to 5.0 from nearly zero a week ago).  I feel more energy and enthusiasm this weekend.  I’m still waiting on my biopsy results; however I’m viewing that as good.  Thanks again for all your support.