Eliminating the Blame Game
In my last blog, accountability vs. deServing Leadership, I mentioned that the primary difference when looking at accountability from a servitude filter vs. the generally accepted norms of accountability can be summed up in one word — Blame.
Playing the blame game never works. According to extensive research conducted by Harvard Business Review, people who blame others for their mistakes lose status, learn less, and perform worse relative to those who own up to their mistakes. Research also shows that the same applies for organizations. Groups and organizations with a rampant culture of blame have a serious disadvantage when it comes to creativity, learning, innovation, and productive risk-taking. While it may produce short term bursts of performance, it does not lead to long-lasting results. Blame neither represents a servant attitude nor positively engages the emotions of those around you — putting it in clear conflict with the very idea of deServing Leadership.
So how do you eliminate the blame game? DeServing Leadership methodology suggests that you do so by creating a culture of psychological safety where you focus on positively engaging the emotions of everyone in your organization — especially when discussing areas of improvement. Imagine a company culture in which everyone is clear about the distinctions between personal responsibility (realizing that you are the principle source of your thoughts, feelings, behaviors, actions and results), accountability (taking ownership for the results of activities in which you have a role) and blame? What if people do not fear stepping up and declaring where they are responsible — both in their mindset and actions — when things aren’t working as planned? What if each person is always looking at where and how they are responsible, rather than blaming themselves or others?
For me, identifying if the blame game is at play is easily identifiable by asking three simple questions — are colleagues encouraged to innovate vs. conform, to what degree is dissent tolerated in the workplace and how do leaders respond when mistakes occur.
So how can deServing Leaders eliminate the blame game within their organizations. Perhaps it can be summed up in another EVENTEQ value — Integrity. We define it as “Do the right thing every time, show respect, be honest and seek to understand others with positive intent.”
Look for breakdowns in the process. Flawed systems, or processes, contribute to most workplace problems. We tend to assume that the cause of problems happened right before and in the same vicinity where the problem occurred. Think beyond the obvious to discover contributing factors separated from the problem by time and proximity. Poor leaders ask “Who’s at fault?” deServing leaders ask “Where did the process break down? If deServing leadership dictates that as a servant to those around you — you must help them continuously improve and feel like they are winning — then the conversation must focus on the systemic breakdown vs. individual blame.
Focus on the problem and solution, not the person. Focusing on the issue or problem, not on the person, creates an open, trusting, communication-rich environment. It enables those you serve to be more willing to accept their failures, come forward with their struggles and work hand-in-hand with you to find a better solution.
Remove emotion. Feedback and guidance turns to blame the instant the person on the receiving end perceives angry and frustrated tones. Even if the anger isn’t directed at the person accountable for the results, they will likely interpret the emotion as blame. Additionally, emotion interferes with the brain’s ability to problem solve and think logically. Eliminating perceived negative emotions or tones is a cornerstone to start to positively engage the emotions of those around you. Writing down what happened and making a conscious effort to review it at a later time allows you to process it more objectively and construct a response that assumes positive intent.
Lead with inquiry. We often tend to assume a lot of facts or why things happened. But when you ask questions with a genuine desire to learn, it not only reinforces your own focus on continuous improvement but also helps eliminate a defensive reaction. A deServing leader must make everyone around them feel like they are winning. Trying to genuinely learn why things happened and how we can work together to make our colleagues win helps positively engage them towards a better outcome. Striving for empirical evidence and trying to look beyond the obvious are usually very effective.
Fail Forward. I spoke about this in an earlier blog and is a term in which I have always believed. We often joke at EQ about the mistakes I have made over the years and how we have learned from them. The Kaizen Institute has a saying “Where no problem is perceived, there can be no improvement.” deServing leaders never forget that we are all still learning to do our jobs better, and we learn best from our mistakes. Most importantly, make sure the people you lead know that you hold this belief. We actually try to push our employees to fail forward — encouraging them to make mistakes as long as it doesn’t impact our clients on show sites and they learn lessons to help towards future innovation.
Be Humble. When things go right, deServing leaders share the credit. When things go wrong, they take all the responsibility. That’s tough, but that’s the price of being a deServing leader.
Ask yourself “How did I contribute to this problem?” If you are part of the same system in which the problem was discovered, your actions probably had a role in the situation. Asking yourself this question will help you apply the rest of these principles.
Focus on continuous improvement. Creating a culture where learning — rather than avoiding mistakes — is the top priority will help to ensure that people feel free to talk about and learn from their errors.
This reflective “we are all accountable” mindset combined with a fail forward philosophy creates a continuously learning orientation. Its underscores positive emotional engagement, focuses on serving those around you, and aids the long-term development of deServing leaders across the organization.