Category Archives: Accountability

Time to Step Up

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“I am ready to throw up my hands. I have come up with eight ways to Sunday for our route technicians to do a better job on their service calls. I am ready to do a Flutie drop kick and just let them deal with it.” Russell commiserated, hoping I would be sympathetic.

“Well, I think it’s a good idea,” I said.

“What do you mean?” replied Russell, still looking for sympathy.

“I mean, I think you should call your technicians together and let them deal with it. Look, the problem isn’t that your ideas are bad; the problem is they are your ideas. If you want your technicians to do a better job on service calls, the ideas have to come from them.

“One of the biggest mistakes young managers make is thinking that you have to solve all the problems of the world. You don’t. Spread the burden. You will be surprised at how your technicians will step up to the plate.”

Mailing It In

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“I’m stumped,” Susana announced. “I talk to my team, give them their assignments, so they know what to do, but then, it just seems they mail it in.”

“Meaning?” I asked. “Mail it in?”

“I can’t put my finger on it,” she said. “The team shows up for work. They show up on time. They do the work, but it doesn’t seem they care. I tried to talk to a couple of them about it, but they just shrugged it off.”

“I know what a shrug looks like, but what did they say?”

“They said the work was okay, that if they wanted something more out of their job, they would just go find it somewhere else. I was a little shocked. I mean, when I was growing up, jobs were scarce, and I felt lucky to just have a job. Finding another job wasn’t easy.”

“And, how did you feel about that job?” I wanted to know.

Susana stopped. “You know, I guess it was just okay.”

“Kind of like your current team?”

Susana nodded.

“So, what is different between your experience and your current team’s experience?” I asked.

“I used to think it was all about the unemployment rate. You know, supply and demand. Right now, there are lots of available jobs, so I guess it follows that mobility, free agency is pretty high.”

“And, what is the cost of that free agency, to you as a manager?”

“Turnover is a killer. I thought when we came out of COVID, when people’s government money ran out, there would be a glut of applicants looking for work. But the labor market is tight. Finding people, finding the right people, getting them trained up, letting them make a few mistakes is expensive.” Susana shrugged. “Then, if they are the wrong fit, I have to start all over again.”

“Is this just happening to you, or is it happening to other companies, too?”

“You can read about it in the press. It’s all over,” she replied.

“I know you pay competitive wages, so it’s not all about the money. Your work is no more, no less interesting than your competitor’s, so what is it, that would give your company, your team, a leg up in team member engagement?”

The Relationship

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So, I left Shannon to ponder why. Why was she drawn to be a manager? I asked you the same question.

Shannon was promoted to manager as the next thing in her career. It was different than she thought it would be. She thought being a manager would make her more important (it does). Being a manager provides authority to tell people what to do (prescribing authority).

The additional compensation doesn’t last. Being important may stroke a manager’s ego, but that ego trip wears thin very fast in the face of accountability. It’s not about the manager. It’s about the relationship between the manager and the team member. Shannon’s report –

“But you were right. It wasn’t for the money. It wasn’t so I could order people around. I just want to make a difference. A difference for the company, a difference for the people on my team and to make a difference for me.”

It seems that Shannon has a cause. But having a cause is not enough. To be a truly effective manager, Shannon has to be had by the cause. And it take some time to understand the cause, to be had by it.

We Improvise

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“Not one plan, but four plans?” I wanted confirmation from Roberto.

He nodded. “I was in the Marines. We had a saying, ‘We don’t plan. We improvise.’ But, improvisation only works if you are prepared with a plan. What’s the first part of every plan?”

“Purpose,” I replied. “We all have intentions, mostly unspoken. A plan is created when intentions become a documented purpose.”

“Improvisation only works when there is a commonly agreed-to purpose,” Roberto continued. “Without a purpose, improvisation becomes chaos. The chaos may be interesting, but it accomplishes little. Purpose drives the next step.”

“Visualization,” I replied.

“Everyone on the team must agree to the purpose and hold a similar vision of what that future state looks like,” Roberto explained.

“How do we know the picture each holds is close to the same picture of their elbowed teammate?”

“Simple,” Roberto grinned. “They talk to each other. It’s a discussion. It is the necessary work of improvisation. When all hell breaks loose, we have to be prepared to make the micro-decisions of the moment, in concert. Serendipity doesn’t happen by random chance. Serendipity is all about our intentions.”

“And?”

“And only then can we create the mile markers to chart our progress, the goals, objectives of our micro-decisions. What looks like serendipity only occurs when we create the context of a plan in which to operate. It may appear we are winging it, but our actions require preparation to be effective toward our purpose.”

Discretion in the Quality of the Data

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“You describe the role as entry level. The output must conform to strict guidelines, which creates the quality standard. What are the decisions that must be made in connection with the work?”

Arlene was shaking her head from side to side. “We don’t allow a lot of latitude with this work. Sending prescription drugs by common carrier is serious business.”

“You think you don’t allow latitude. In fact, you tell your team members there isn’t a lot of latitude, when in fact there is. There are a ton of decisions that must be made.”

Arlene was quiet.

“Look, most of the prescribed duties involve collecting data from your customers to determine their qualifications. While it seems cut and dried, there are many decisions that must be made about the quality of their responses, the accuracy and completeness of the data.

  • Is the customer address we have on file their current mailing address?
  • Is the customer mailing address the same as the shipping address?
  • Is the telephone number we have on file a mobile number we can send a confirmation text message to?
  • Will the shipping priority we have on file assure the product reaches the customer on time?
  • If the customer does not answer the door, is it okay to leave the product on the front porch, or is there another more secure location?

“The difference between ok performance and outstanding performance is not in filling out the forms, but in the decisions related to the quality of the data that goes on the forms. The job may be completing the forms, but the work is the decisions that must be made.

“An important discussion between the manager and the team member is not about the forms, but about those decisions.”

Entry Level Work, Not Cut and Dried

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“I still don’t know what you are getting at,” Arlene shook her head. “It’s entry level work. You are right, it’s not that interesting.”

“Don’t be so swift,” I reprimanded. “Let’s talk about this entry-level work. First, what is work?”

Arlene was looking up, retrieving the answer planted in her mind some weeks ago. “I remember. Work is making decisions and solving problems.”

“Okay. And what decisions must be made in connection with this entry-level work?”

“It’s pretty cut and dried,” Arlene related. “Our work is highly regulated. Everything we do has to be within very specific guidelines.”

“And what if it’s not cut and dried,” I challenged. “You see, the guidelines you work under only set the quality standards for the output. Let’s ask the question again. What decisions must be made in connection with this work? And as we answer, I think you will find this work is quite a bit more than entry-level.”

Interest in the Work (Not the Job)

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“What’s missing in this young recruit’s career?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” Arlene replied. “All she seemed interested in was how many vacation days she is going to get.”

“Why do you think she is focused on her vacation days? What’s missing? What was missing in her work before she came to your company two months ago? And perhaps is still missing in her work?”

“I don’t know,” admitted Arlene. “It is pretty basic, entry level work. Perhaps there really isn’t that much to focus on, except how much vacation comes with the job.”

“You might be right be right about the job,” I agreed. “But what about the work?”

When guiding a young recruit, it’s important to help them see beyond the basic duties of their role and understand the bigger picture.

Often, employees new to the workforce can become fixated on the immediate rewards—like vacation days—without recognizing the deeper value of the work itself.

This is where solid mentorship comes into play. Instead of simply filling a position, the recruit should be encouraged to find meaning in the tasks, build a sense of purpose, and connect their efforts to the overall mission of the organization.

At Teresa Duke Consulting, we’ve found that employees thrive when they’re encouraged to engage in continuous learning and development.

Helping new hires understand how their role contributes to the company’s goals fosters a sense of ownership and responsibility.

This kind of guidance isn’t about offering perks or taking shortcuts. It’s about nurturing the mindset of growth, where the work itself becomes a pathway to both professional success and personal fulfillment.

Leadership Charisma

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Leadership is a billion dollar business, yet all around us, we rarely see effective leadership. There are books, seminars, groups and programs to build better leaders (that’s the billion dollar business), yet much of that effort is wasted and fruitless.

The effectiveness of an organization is based on its structure and the role of leadership is to design and build that structure. Effective leadership has less to do with charisma and personality, more to do with building an organizational system to get work done.

Structure begins with the founder, a structure of one. There is work to be done and the founder is doing the work. There is always work left over, so the founder hires three or four people. These people do a little bit of everything. The work is organized around the scarce resources of infant structure. At some point the founder realizes the work can no longer be organized around the people, the people have to be organized around the work.

Organizing the people around the work requires that specialized roles be defined, tasks, activities and expected outputs from those activities. This is the emergence of roles.

This organization is no longer a structure of one, but a structure of many. It is not enough for each person to play their role, the roles have to be designed to work together, more complex than a structure of one, a structure of many. And, organizational structure is born.

Organizational structure is simply the way we define the working relationships between people. The two things that must be defined are –

  • In this working relationship, what is the accountability?
  • In this working relationship, what is the authority? Authority to do what? Make decisions and solve problems the way I would have them solved.

And, so the structure of one becomes the structure of an organization. I don’t care about your personality or charisma as a leader. I only care whether you can design and execute the structure, to get some work done.

The Team Retreat

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Naomi had several sheets in front of her, spread out like a game of solitaire. “I don’t understand,” she remarked. “I thought I had this group nailed together.”

I dug deep into my bag of diagnostic questions and asked, “How so?”

“Our company has really been working hard this year on teamwork. We know that higher levels of cooperation and cross support make a big difference on our output. I thought I had this team dialed in, but sometimes cooperation seems to be the last thing on their mind.”

“What makes you think you had this team dialed in?” I asked.

Naomi was quick to respond, “Oh, we started out this year with a big retreat, back when we had budget for it. It was a great team building experience. We had a ropes course and we did group games. I mean, we didn’t sing Kumbaya, but, you know, it was a great weekend. Everyone came out of there feeling great.”

“And how long did you expect that to last?” I probed.

“Well, the consultant told us we needed to create some sort of team bonus, you know, where every one depends on the rest of the team to get a little something extra at the end. That way, if one makes it, they all make it. Shared fate, he called it.”

“I see. And how is that working out for you?”

It’s Not Your People

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It’s your structure. Peter Schutz (1930-2017), former CEO at Porsche quipped, “the successful companies are those that get extraordinary results from ordinary people.” It’s not your people, it’s your structure.

Structure is the way you think about your company. That includes your business model, who you think your customers are, how you think they use your product or service, why you think they use your company vs a competitor. It’s your structure.

Organizational structure is way we define the working relationships between people. The first level is every person playing their role. The second level is the way those roles work together. It’s your systems. The way we think about roles and the way those roles work together determines the effectiveness of the organization.

Every company has people. Every company thinks their people are special (and they are). It’s the structure that determines the company’s success. Extraordinary results from ordinary people. It’s your structure.