Take responsibility they said!

I had been interested in the Accountability Process for some time. Christopher Avery but it is from reading his book entitled “The Responsibility Process – Unlocking your natural ability to live and lead with Power” that I decided to address the subject a little more in depth.

Indeed, I had the opportunity to share it during 2 conferences this year, in particular at MiXiT 2019 (of which you can find the video at the end of the article) and Agile Lyon 2019.

I offer you here a transcription of the content of these conferences, with potentially some additional details! 😉

Happy reading !

Definitions of Liability

Before getting to the heart of the matter, I looked at how Responsibility was defined.

For that, I went to see its definition in the Larousse and I found mainly 3 of them:

1. Obligation or moral necessity to answer, to vouch for one's actions or those of others.

2. Function, position that gives decision-making powers, but requires accountability.

3. Made for something to be the cause, the origin of a damage.

I confess that it did not sell me the dream!

Now, maybe there's another way to look at Responsibility, and that's what Christopher Avery did brilliantly in his book.

So let's go a little further! 🙂

Personal responsibility

In his book, Christopher first speaks at the individual level by addressing the subject of Personal Responsibility. He thus compares 2 notions: Being responsible vs Taking responsibility 100 %.

To be responsible

According to Christopher, being responsible means:

Being good and acceptable in the eyes of another person or society. 

It means receiving approval and conforming to expectations.

So we can deduce that it is:

A commitment to experience feelings of security through approval.

Take responsibility at 100 %

Taking responsibility at 100 % is more like:

Seeing yourself as a powerful causal force in our life experience.

Even if this expression may seem a little heavy, I found it really full of meaning. Indeed, this means that through our choices, we can see ourselves as the main cause of our happiness or our unhappiness, our success or our failure, our commitment or our disengagement... It is to have the ability to choose one's response to life situations. We can deduce that it is:

A commitment to be owner of his life, At personal leadership and to his freedom

Same Same but Different

Although these two concepts are different, they are not mutually exclusive.

The commitment to take our responsibilities at 100 % gives us a strong feeling of being responsible.

The reverse is less true. A commitment to be responsible could undermine our willingness to take responsibility at every turn: we can easily be stopped by problems once we perceive them as insurmountable.

Indeed, as previously described being responsible is a commitment to feel feelings of security through approval, not through freedom, one's own leadership or personal growth.

By definition being responsible relies on feelings of guilt and D'obligation and ready-made answers denial, ofcharge and of justification.

corporate responsibility

When we apply the previous notions to the business world, our comparison will take a slightly different form. Indeed, we will compare the notions of Responsibility and D'Accountability often found in the RACI, an approach used to clarify “responsibilities”, precisely.

Note: You can see that language also has an impact here. Indeed, while English uses 2 different words for 2 distinct notions, we only use one in French to talk about 2 different things. I would therefore allow myself to use the English terms thereafter for greater clarity.

Accountability

Accountability or literally the ability to be accountable if asked.

It is defined as:

The act of managing performance and expectations.

Its characteristics are as follows:

Other-oriented	we are accountable to other people whose approval we expect, which will generate a feeling of security
Focus on the past	we look at what has already been done to be able to report on it
External and independent of self	this responsibility is rarely the result of personal initiative, it often falls on us without our having asked for it – “You will be responsible for the good atmosphere in the team! »

Responsibility

If we break down the term Responsibility, we get:

Responsibility = Response + Ability

This gives a lot of meaning to this notion that we can summarize in our ability to respond to life situations. Another way to define it is:

It is a sense of ownership of an experience, willingness and ability to take effective action

Its characteristics are as follows:

self oriented	It's a personal decision to act on the situation
Focus Present	The question we are asking is fundamentally: “What am I going to do now to respond to this situation? »
Internal	In a given situation, 2 people may not react in the same way. Responsibility is completely internal and therefore subjective

The Dictatorship of Accountability

According to Christopher, the systematic management of Accountability is the goal of any hierarchical organization. This is also one of the first reasons for having a hierarchy. We can then consider Accountability as one of the first management tools.

Indeed, an organization is built when there is more work to do than a person's ability to do it. We then hire people and delegate the work to them. This is called the Accountability process, also known as delegation, or of performance management.

Historically, management has over-focused on this aspect of Accountability and under-focused on people's willingness and natural ability to respond. 

Why, you ask me? Well sIf we believe that people should be monitored and measured to ensure their performance, then we will invest in performance management tools that will give us a sense of control over our business.

Note : You will find here a similarity with the Douglas McGregor's Theory X.

Forging a culture of Responsibility, where people are present, take ownership and perform seems much more complex and uncertain than gerating accountabilities, providing a sense of certainty, even if it is false certainty. 

This mode of operation today generates many problems within organizations – leaders at all levels seeking to position themselves in the hierarchy and considering that:

Holding people accountable is more important

than to develop in them feelings of personal responsibility

The result is simple: work and workers suffer.

Driven by Accountability

The more we focus on managing people through Accountability, the more we distance them from taking responsibility.

Indeed, Accountability is based on a credible threat:

Do this or suffer the consequences!

If the environment penalizes people who genuinely take responsibility, that is to say, who demonstrate an ability to think for yourself and act proactively in the resolutionsolving the real problems rather than foolishly doing what they are asked,during even the best will avoid taking responsibility and work will suffer.

Accountability focuses mainly on the notion of being responsible (being well and safe) than on taking responsibility at 100 TP3T. This form of responsibility is therefore seen as a negative relationship process, not positive, often generating the fear. 

When fear increases, responsibility decreases.

With levels of ownership and responsibility at rock bottom, Accountability-based systems tend to become increasingly onerous and complex in their attempt to monitor performance. Indeed, we add layers of control and documentation, employees are then more and more constrained and therefore even less able to respond effectively.

Note: We could make the link with the drift of using solutions Complicated to respond to issues Complexes – see Cynefin

Avoiding Responsibility then seems the safest path for this kind of system.

Following the conference of Tristan Nitot on privacy at MiXiT 2019, whom I thank, I take the liberty of borrowing his quote from Glenn Greewald, a journalist who started from 2013 to publish the revelations of Edward Snowden on the mass surveillance programs.

When we are watched, listened to, our behavior changes completely. […]

A society in which people can be watched at all times is a society

which urges conformity, obedience and submission,

and that is why all dictators seek such a system.”

–Glenn Greenwald, The importance of privacy

This quote seems to me to give a similar look, with a much larger scope, beyond the corporate world. This shows the damage that such a system can have on the way we behave today.

Another look at Responsibility

Contrary to what one might think, Personal Responsibility and therefore personal leadership are ines in each of us. It is not a character trait even if some will have the ability to implement it more easily than others at a given moment. It is a mental process which operates in everyone in a way predictable.

This mental process, the Responsibility Process, regulates how we choose to avoid or take responsibility. This means that liability can be systematically observed, taught and practiced. Anyone can learn to master accountability and anyone can develop accountability in a team, family, or work culture.

Encourage responsibility

To encourage responsibility in others, one can for example:

• Give them maximumautonomy so that they can take responsibility;
• Their allow mistakes to be made, to correct them themselves, and to learn rather than trying to prevent their mistakes or save them

In this way, we are simply trying to recognize their natural ability to respond allowing them a high degree of autonomy and non-intrusion. The opposite (lots of checks, evaluations, and corrections) conditions people to become dependent on authority, to stop thinking for themselves, and to find freedom uncomfortable.

Responsible organization

Imagine an environment in which all people are in Responsibility:

• The level ofappropriation and of personal responsibility teams would be high
• The level ofcommitment would be visible
• The rate of productivity and therefore theachievement of objectives would no longer be a problem
• Each person would have the ability and the critical freedom to answer yes or no
• THE personal leadership would be high
• Therefore we could see a self-organization even a natural self-direction emerge

Note: I also have the deep conviction that if we do not work on Personal Responsibility at first, it will be difficult to hope to see self-organization.

In a setting like this, Accountability systems can be simple and lightweight because we no longer need layers of oversight and checks to make sure people are delivering the intended results. People taking responsibility eliminate the need to hold others accountable. This is what high performance systems look like.

Responsibility makes Accountability unnecessary.

If you ask me if something will be done by a certain date and I say yes, you probably won't have to ask me again - you trust me to keep my commitments because I took responsibility and I accept the impacts. If it wasn't, I would have said so.

Transparency and Ownership replace the need

heavy performance management systems

Tool #1: the Responsibility Process

When everything is going well, we have this ability to act and make decisions in an appropriate way with all our resources. This is called the mental state of Responsibility.

It's when things don't go as planned that anxiety takes over: everything becomes more difficult, doubt sets in and we enter a process that prevents us from seeing the situation clearly. We then enter a sequence of mental states called coping states : the Responsibility Process is then triggered.

The Accountability Process sheds light on the cause and effect connections we make in our heads when things bother us and helps us explore what makes us take or avoid our responsibilities. This mental dialogue can be both internal to oneself and external, in interaction with one's environment or with other people. Whatever its nature, the feeling that emerges is constraining and prevents us from obtaining what we really want.

It turns out that the pattern of mental states is predictable – hence the ordering in the figure above. We all go through these different mental states more or less quickly and tend to get stuck in a particular place. It is observation that will help us identify and overcome these mental states of adaptation to reach the mental state of Responsibility more often.

Let's go into a little more detail in each of the mental states:

Charge

It is your fault !

It is through this mental state that we enter automatically: it is the gateway to the Responsibility Process.

Indeed, the Prosecution is triggered by our emotions – when a problem arises – and not by our intellect.

We're going to hold the other person to blame for what's happening to us and we're going to redirect all our anxiety about it to them. It's a victim mentality where we give all our ability to respond to the other.

Justification

We always did like that !

Going beyond the Prosecution, we understand that blaming a person has no interest. We will then blame the situation for what it brings us that is uncomfortable! Excuses are then often used to justify that things are the way they are. We then consider ourselves as victims of the situation against which we can do nothing.

Guilt

I have not done enough effort!

By going beyond the Justification, we understand that the problem is perhaps not elsewhere and that there is a chance that we have contributed to it. We then begin to blame ourselves for what happens to us – which is often felt in the form of Guilt.

The assumption is that we lack what we need and we don't have what it takes to get by. We think that the problem is deserved because we should not have done such and such an action which led us to this situation.

In summary: We feel bad because we are missing something and deserve to feel bad about it. Not only can we be ashamed of it, but we also feel guilty.

Note: The original term is "Shame".

Obligation

I have to go to this meeting.

By overcoming guilt, we set ourselves in motion to quickly get rid of this source of anxiety. We then do what we have to do rather than what we want to do.

We feel trapped and we have the impression of having to:

• Do something you don't want to do (action)
• To be someone you don't want to be (identity)
• Having something you don't want to have (experience)

It is a destructive combination that knows how to imprison the most brilliant and ambitious people.

Our culture reinforces that keeping commitments is a good thing even if you don't like them: " Stop complaining ", "Do what is right".

However, Obligation is not only a mental state but also a feeling state. It does not refer to the commitment itself but to how one feels about it. These are 2 very different things.

Indeed, when we are in Obligation, our motivation is low and we feel resentment to be in the situation. This conflict between what we want and what we have produced stress and anxiety.

Namely that resentment is a virus that grows as you go – the more you have what you don't want – and which is shared! We naturally attract other people with this same resentment and we amplify our cynicism and sarcasm together!

Leak

Still 3 weeks, 2 days and 1 hour before the holidays.

Flight is a particular mental state in the sense that it is invoked when the suffering linked to Guilt and Obligation is too strong. Indeed, anxiety tends to accumulate there.

We think we can't have what we want. We then put the problem in the car park but it is only temporary storage, it will come back. We disengage rather than deal with it.

Avoiding prevents us from learning and above all it means that we keep the problem at our doorstep.

Denial

What problem ?

Denial is the mental state in which one has not yet become aware of the existence of the problem.

Responsibility

I choose to go to this meeting to come out with a decision.

In the mental state of Responsibility, one has the capacity and the power to create, choose and attract what we really want. You feel free, open, expansive and have room to think and explore new things. One is free to choose and free from preconceived ideas about a problem or a solution and therefore ready to re-examine the situation from a different angle.

We have enough confidence in our own resources (intelligence, creativity) and in security to courageously confront the situations of life.

Summary

Mental state	Example	Diagnostic	Remedy	Exit strategy
Charge	The client was not clear on what he wanted!	The other is at fault and I can't do anything.	The other must change.	Refuse to blame the other.
Justification	We always did like that !	The situation is responsible and there is nothing I can do.	This is the situation who needs to change	Refuse to believe his story.
Guilt	I have not done enough effort!	It's my fault, I deserve it. I can not do anything.	I have to change.	Stop beating yourself up.
Obligation	I have to go to this meeting.	I do not have a choice.	do the minimum to get rid of it.	Refuse to feel trapped.
Leak	Still 3 weeks, 2 days and 1 hour before the holidays.	It's too painful I can not do anything about it.	Give up, opt out.	Refuse to leave the problem at the parking lot.
Denial	What problem ?
Responsibility	I choose to go to this meeting to come out with a decision.	I have what it takes to deal with this problem	Facing the pain and solving the problem for good.

Stay under the line

When we find ourselves under the line, this means that the problem has not been solved. We then set up a defense strategy:

• We consider that the problem is stronger than us
• We can have feelings of confinement, of malaise
• We can tend to complain and be cynical
• We suffer the situation

When we are under the line,

we talk about the problem more than we deal with it.

Go above the line

Go above the line, is to decide to tackle the problem with our own resources. We then set up a evolution strategy :

• We refuse to accept the automatic response of our mind
• We see the problem differently
• You can feel feelings of freedom and lightness
• We consider we have the necessary resources to solve the problem

When we're over the line,

we have more of what we want and less of what we don't want.

Tool # 2: the 3 Keys to Responsibility

To master Responsibility, Christopher offers us a second tool which he calls “the 3 keys to Responsibility”. These are 3 activities to practice on a daily basis in order to increase one's capacity to be free and in Responsibility.

Intention (the key to success)

Approach life situations with the intention of operating from the mental state of Responsibility

Here are some ways to learn how to master Intention:

• Allow yourself to " to want" 
• Abandon the " duty » (the advice we give to ourselves) as « i should do this“, “ i should be that" 
• When you are upset or uncertain, ask yourself the question: "Qhat do I want?" 
• Frequently list what you want – including identity elements (Be), action (Do) and experience (To have).
• Expressing your victories – an intention fulfilled – whatever the size:

Awareness (the key to change)

Observing without judgment the mental state in which one finds oneself

Here are some ways to learn how to develop Awareness:

• Stop evaluating and judging, start observing
• Understand your biases
• Try different points of view
• Examine your fears

Confront (the key to evolution)

Face your inner conflict to overcome the problem

To learn how to face and practice the Confront, here is a track proposed by WikiHow :

1. Accept your current situation

• Identify denial
• Practice theradical acceptance
• Identify his part in the creation of this situation
• Thinking about what you would like your life to look like

2. Work on your feelings

• write a diary
• Practice the mindfulness (mindfulness)
• Express gratitude for what you have
• Challenge your negative thoughts
• Do self-soothing activities

3. Create a better future

• Focus on what you control
• Decide what you want for yourself in the future
• Make a plan to achieve your goal

Conclusion

It is important to keep in mind that the Accountability Process only works if you apply it to yourself (like any self-respecting personal development tool).

It is an extremely powerful tool in its simplicity and helps us relearn to want more than to have to.

Now, how can others make use of it as well? Well, share it around you and demonstrate it, day after day.

Note: Be careful not to impose Responsibility, otherwise you will have Obligation. Likewise for you, if you impose Responsibility on yourself, you will have Guilt or Obligation.

For further

• https://prezi.com/ssqbqt3vp7so/responsibility-accountability/?webgl=0
• https://leadershipgift.com/
• https://responsibility.com/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-T3IZ2ISxag
• https://fr.slideshare.net/ChristopherAvery/three-keys-to-selfdirection-and-leadership