Quotes About Accountability

Forgiveness is also important because, as a study of surgical errors found, "when a subordinate sees his technical errors are forgiven, he recognizes there is no incentive to hide them. He is less likely, therefore, to compound his problems by attempting to treat problems that are over his head for fear of superordinate reprisal.

The truth is that bosses...don't matter as much as most of us believe. They typically account for less than 15 percent of the gap between good and bad organizational performance, although they often get over 50 percent of the blame and credit.

Accountability means that an organization is packed with people who embody and protect excellence (even when they are tired, overburdened, and distracted), who work vigorously to spread it to others, and who spot, help, critique, and (when necessary) push aside colleagues who fail to live and spread it.

better to shoot the messenger than to learn about—and fix—the problems. In contrast to such constructive defiance, I know bosses who employ the opposite strategy to undermine and drive out incompetent superiors. One called it "malicious compliance," following idiotic orders from

Perry "puts all the bad apples in one barrel" so they don't wreck other teams. He then assigns a no-nonsense coach to lead the bad apples or does it himself—he is adept at dispensing tough love.

As engineer Sanjeev Singh explained, if you keep waiting for people to tell you what to do, don't ask for help when you get stuck, and won't show others your work until it is perfect, "you won't last long at Facebook.

fear of taking responsibility, especially the sense that it is safer to do nothing, or something bad, than the right thing.

La indecisión es una particularidad de los malos jefes.

He sought out and surrounded himself with people that he trusted to tell him the truth (rather than what he hoped to hear) about the severity and nuances of challenges that he and the company faced—and when he was screwing up.

Refusal to accept blame, pointing fingers at others, and wimpy language can help bosses keep their jobs for a while, but it usually backfires in the long run. No matter what is said, bosses are seen as responsible for what their people do.

on outside the meeting and agree on a steward to be responsible for it. With frequent, crisp stand-up meetings, there can never be the excuse that the opportunity to communicate was not there. We insist that bad news travels just as fast

And some of the worst add an extra twist: they take perverse pleasure in insisting that project managers like her commit to timetables and budgets that are impossible to meet—and then berate and bad-mouth them when the project begins to fail, even when the project manager had warned them that their goals were impossible to achieve (and the client insisted on charging forward despite the expert advice).

I find that if you take the opportunity to throw out a subtle reminder of the core values we are required to adhere to, the a**hole quickly backs up, swallows the words, and rethinks the tactic.

I can't ever let the actions of other people cause me to sin.

Secrecy was the problem; transparency the obvious cure.

It is the difference: we generalize do not. Specific bad humans did specific bad things; those humans do we not like. But the rest of humanity we judge one by one.

did miss with the first shot, I'd be able to get off at least three shots before you get more than four hundred yards out on your horse," Jess replied bluntly. "What if you miss with all three shots?" Jess finally put the cartridge back into his front pocket. "I'd feel bad about it, but

I accept all of the responsibility, but none of the blame. - Nixon

As long as there are only 3 to 4 people on the floor, the country is in good hands. It's only when you have 50 to 60 in the Senate that you want to be concerned.

Trustees have the obligation to oversee the use of power in order to check its corrupting influence on those to whom it is entrusted, and to assure that those affected by its use are positively helped and are not harmed.

Trustees are accountable to all parties at interest for the best possible performance of the institution in the service of the needs of all constituencies—including society at large.

Some basic principles will need to be explicitly accepted, such as that no one, absolutely no one, is to be entrusted with the operational use of power without the close oversight of fully functioning trustees.

Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on.

Whenever men take the law into their own hands, the loser is the law. And when the law loses, freedom languishes.