Welcome to Resilience Talk hosted by Paul Spencer of Second Nature Solutions.
Let's dive in.
Paul Spencer: When I first started working with family owned businesses
almost not quite 10 years ago now, which seems like a ton of time ago.
Um, but they, one, one thing that I would learn from them is they
wanted to, and they use this word, they wanted to hold some of the
people around them more accountable.
And they would use the, the accountable word, Paul, how do I hold my
operations person more accountable?
How do I hold my delivery team more accountable?
How can I be more accountable for the salespeople of, uh, delivering
what they say they're gonna deliver?
And so what that meant for me listening and, and kind of interpreting
that is they didn't always trust that the people doing the work.
Or whatever role they were, they were, um, describing, uh, that they were doing
what they should be doing about that.
Um, and so I always thought it was a strange question and didn't quite
resonate with how I thought about leading people and moving teams and getting.
Teams to be more productive.
Uh, very rarely, if at all, use the word accountable.
Um, and so that's what I wanna talk about today is what is accountability
and what are we really after?
What, when we say we wanna hold somebody accountable, what are we really after?
What is our aim?
And I would say that our aim is really about.
Productivity or being efficient or getting things done, um, right.
It's really mostly about execution.
And so what does it mean to hold somebody to execute, right?
Um, whether I'm delegating that meaning I have a team below me,
or I'm responsible for, uh, let's call it a department or a group of.
20 people, a hundred people below me, I'm not gonna be doing all of that work
and I'm not executing all of that work, but I'm still held accountable for the
outcomes of that team or that department.
And really in the end, it's all about execution.
And so how do we execute?
That's the question, Paul.
How can we get better at executing?
And the distinction there, it's very subtle, but I think it's really
important because the shift is how do we execute, meaning how, what is,
if we think about demming, by what method, by when, by who that is.
That is, those are some of the questions, uh, that will be asked
in order to how to better execute.
Well, what method are you using?
What processes are in place?
How are those processes working well with each other?
How are they not working well with each other?
Who's involved?
What roles are in play?
What's the timing between processes, between roles?
What's the expectations between those timings and what is necessary, uh, for
the information from one process to another, from a timing perspective,
in order for those things to flow well, that is how you execute.
Um, the other one, the original question is, how do I hold you accountable?
How do I hold so and so accountable is a personal person question.
Meaning how do I get Paul to buy in?
How do I get Paul to actually do the work that I'm paying him for?
Right?
How do I get Paul to make sure that he's doing, um, everything
that I've asked him to do because he's dropping a lot of things.
Right.
Those are, those are two different problems and they're actually
two different mindsets on how you solve the aim, which is efficiency.
It's, uh, being productive.
It's executing.
And so if, if you start with the accountability, if you start with
the person, how do I fix Paul?
How do I get Paul more motivated?
Paul's not motivated.
How do you know that?
How do you know Paul's not motivated?
Well.
I don't think he's very accountable for the things that I tell him to do.
Hmm.
Interesting.
Right?
That's an interesting observation.
So, uh, the point of the conversation here is shift your mindset to process
over people and you will get closer to your aim, which is executing, which
is productivity, which is outcomes.
And with those outcomes we can get to places where we start to learn.
And so this is the other, the other part of the accountability part is, uh,
from my perspective, interacting with you, the owner, you're saying, I want
to better hold so and so accountable.
Okay, so now maybe I will get some better understanding of what that means from you.
And ultimately, I would say 10 times outta 10, that means execution.
So what is it that you want to be executing on?
What are those outcomes that you're looking for?
And then I can go and talk with so and so, whoever that is.
And what I will find 10 times outta 10 is that, uh, from their perspective, they're
being pulled in multiple directions.
The owner has actually told them to go do this thing, and then it doesn't take,
uh, 24 hours or less that the owner has told them to go do this other thing.
And, uh, and then before you know it, but before the week is even
over, the owner has tampered.
With the work, the execution of that particular person multiple times.
And so that person is being pulled in multiple directions, doesn't quite
understand the different priorities given to him by the owner and
therefore is not very accountable.
Right.
And uh, so then the other part of it too is on.
From the, um, from the, let's just call 'em the executive's perspective, dealing
with the owner, is there aren't any, um, clear expectations on, um, how things
should work, how things should operate.
It's just go do it.
And so what happens is, um, I may be a good ex executor, but.
I may be inconsistent in executing because of the dynamic of, say, our
customers have high variation or the dynamic of how we deliver or maybe just
the dynamic of our industry in general.
Um, and so what the owner is observing is that Paul's just
not very good at executing.
He's not accountable.
And what I would say is that Paul, as the executive is not very consistent.
In his execution because of the variation of everything that I just described.
And so therefore, that is a process issue.
It's not a paw issue, it's not a person issue, it's a process issue
anyway, so that is where you start.
If you're, if any, if this leaks out of your mouth, how do I
hold somebody accountable, then uh, you should stop, reflect.
Why am I asking this?
And then ask it a different way, which is, how do we get better execution?
And I guarantee you, you will end up with a different outcome, right?
I'm not talking about the execution outcome, I'm talking about the interaction
you will have with that other executive.
The interaction that you will have on how can we better execute
will be way different than I need to hold you accountable.
Alright.
One other topic on this too is, um, when we, when we go into how do we execute
and the executive is now thinking, excuse me, the executive is now thinking about
processes over the people and trying to get more consistent in his work, meaning.
In order to do that, I have to come up with guidelines about how we do our
work, how I do my work, how my team executes, how we deliver, how my sales
team goes out and finds new prospects.
Now we need to be more consistent with how that occurs.
That doesn't mean we have to be more rigid processes, not rigidity.
Process is consistency and so that I can be more predictable.
In the outcomes, right?
If I'm more consistent, then I can better predict the outcomes
of whatever process that is.
And so when I'm doing that, I have to be willing to experiment.
And I know we've talked about this a million times about the word experiment,
but, and how scary that can be.
Um, but it's meant to be a way of learning.
So that we can find the optimal process.
So if I am to take an idea and write down, um, I could be even, uh, an expert, right?
I've done lots of sales processes and I can write that down and I can say, I
give you that piece of paper and say, here you go, execute on this process.
Now that's probably, um, 50%.
Maybe 80% of the way there, just based on my experience and my
knowledge about how things go.
But it's not gonna be 100% there because you and your team and your business
and your customers are different.
And so you have to take that process and then you have to go execute
it, but then you also have to be willing to experiment with it.
Says, Hey, we're going to approach our customers with this messaging on
this timeframe through this channel.
Um, we're gonna offer at this price, uh, during this timeframe and be
willing to do that so that, because what happens when you do that, you
learn and the customer will not.
Buy your product at that price point will not offer, um, an opportunity to
extend the service beyond the quarter or beyond the year or beyond the month.
Right?
And so what does that do?
That's not a failure.
That is an opportunity for us to ask questions on why.
And gather feedback.
And then for us to be able to adjust either our, the way we sell, the way
we message either our channels or the way we deliver or our product, right?
And so you can see that in order for us to solve the problem of being accountable,
we have to ask how are we executing?
And then when we get into the execution, it's not a one and
done thing and it never will be.
Even when I figure it out, it's always gonna change because there's always chance
to, um, opportunity for improvement.
That's only if everything stays static around me, and we know that
that's not true and it's impossible.
So even if I get to optimal.
Um, I know that the, my customers are gonna change, the economy's gonna change.
My industry is going to change, and so therefore, I'm constantly
experimenting and adjusting and finding optimal within my execution.
That my friends, is how you hold somebody accountable.