What is Accountability, Really?
To help frame this conversation about accountability, I'd like to preface with a brief discussion of accountability as it relates to integrity. C.S. Lewis famously said, "Integrity is doing the right thing even when no one is watching." While true in principle, the “right thing” can be shaped by circumstance and often defined only in retrospect. If we remove the lenses of subjectivity and hindsight, actions taken in good faith are valid and justified in the moment of execution, if not a moment longer.
At its core, integrity isn’t the quality of always being right or perfect. Rather, it is the ability to objectively reflect on our actions and intentions. Stated simply, integrity means holding ourselves accountable. And what is accountability, really? For leaders, accountability is the courage to say, "The buck stops here." Integrity becomes the deliberate application of personal accountability.
The Apollo 1 Disaster: A Case Study in Accountability
In January 1967, astronauts Gus Grissom, Roger Chaffee, and Ed White perished in the tragic Apollo 1 disaster, when a fire erupted during a launch rehearsal. This devastating event could have been an opportunity for blame and finger-pointing. Instead, Gene Kranz, the Mission Control Flight Director, took responsibility. On the following Monday, he addressed his team with what is now known as the "Kranz Dictum," a powerful example of accountability in action:
"Spaceflight will never tolerate carelessness, incapacity, and neglect. Somewhere, somehow, we screwed up. It could have been in design, build, or test. Whatever it was, we should have caught it. We were too gung ho about the schedule and we locked out all of the problems we saw each day in our work. Every element of the program was in trouble and so were we. The simulators were not working, Mission Control was behind in virtually every area, and the flight and test procedures changed daily. Nothing we did had any shelf life. Not one of us stood up and said, "Dammit, stop!" I don't know what Thompson's committee will find as the cause, but I know what I find. We are the cause! We were not ready! We did not do our job. We were rolling the dice, hoping that things would come together by launch day, when in our hearts we knew it would take a miracle. We were pushing the schedule and betting that the Cape would slip before we did.
From this day forward, Flight Control will be known by two words: "Tough" and "Competent". Tough means we are forever accountable for what we do or what we fail to do. We will never again compromise our responsibilities. Every time we walk into Mission Control we will know what we stand for. Competent means we will never take anything for granted. We will never be found short in our knowledge and in our skills. Mission Control will be perfect. When you leave this meeting today you will go to your office and the first thing you will do there is to write "Tough and Competent" on your blackboards. It will never be erased. Each day when you enter the room these words will remind you of the price paid by Grissom, White, and Chaffee. These words are the price of admission to the ranks of Mission Control."
Rather than isolate individual failures, Kranz embraced accountability as a shared responsibility. He demonstrated that accountability uses the pronouns "I," "we," and "us"—but never "you." When a subordinate struggles, the team struggles. When a supplier fails, the team fails. True accountability is collaborative and systemic, not about assigning blame.
Accountability vs. Blame: A Shift in Leadership Thinking
"Set expectations and hold people accountable" may sound reasonable, but this often serves as a thinly veiled version of "Do your job, or we’ll find someone who will." Such zero-sum thinking is not leadership—it’s coercion. As W. Edwards Deming pointed out, productive relationships, whether at work or at home, require trust, not winners and losers.
Why do so many collaborative efforts fall into patterns of competition and antagonism? Too often, teams operate as though success must come at someone else’s expense. When we approach collaboration with a mindset that prioritizes assigning fault or highlighting individual shortcomings, we create unnecessary friction that erodes trust and undermines performance.
Collaboration should foster shared accountability, yet adversarial dynamics emerge when the focus shifts from solving problems to either taking credit or assigning blame. These dynamics not only reduce productivity but also discourage transparency, as team members become more concerned with protecting themselves than with contributing to the solution. In this environment, people fear speaking up, innovation is stifled, and the collective effort suffers.
Genuine collaboration demands mutual respect, shared goals, and a willingness to support each other. The focus must shift from fault-finding to problem-solving, from competition to partnership. Sustainable success can only be achieved when every member of the team feels empowered, trusted, and valued. In contrast, blame and confrontation diminish morale, encouraging disengagement rather than progress.
Does anyone show up to work intending to do a poor job? Is it reasonable to assume that front-line workers are to blame for a plant shutdown or lost market share? This is an absurd notion legitimized by calls for "attention to detail," "vigilance," and "trying harder." Did Blockbuster fail because of lazy store clerks? Was RadioShack’s downfall the fault of underperforming store managers? Of course not. These employees did their jobs; the systemic failures lay with leadership. Management owns the system—and must be accountable for fixing it.
System Management: The True Measure of Accountability
Research confirms that systems have a greater impact on outcomes than individual effort. No amount of vigilance can overcome bottlenecks, roadblocks, or poorly designed processes. When workers struggle, it’s often because management has failed to create a system that supports success. Burnout, absenteeism, disengagement, and turnover are not root problems; they are symptoms of broken systems.
Churning through employees and suppliers while market share erodes is not a coincidence. If employees seem incompetent or suppliers fail to deliver, the real question is: Who hired them? Who designed or allowed these broken systems to persist? Accountability means facing these uncomfortable truths, rather than defaulting to blame.
If, instead of assuming incompetence, we assumed that everyone in the organization was capable and engaged, we might be forced to conclude that our problems are caused by more than incapacity and neglect. Blame is easy, but effective management demands that we dig deeper. Just as doctors must look beyond surface symptoms to diagnose illnesses, leaders must engage in system management to address underlying issues.
Accountability as Ownership: Moving Beyond Blame
Accountability is not about fault-finding. There is no skill in pointing out faults, and no value in assigning blame. Those who engage in these behaviors mistake noise for substance and motion for progress. True accountability involves taking ownership of problems and committing to systemic improvement.
Leadership accountability requires constancy of purpose and dedication to the team’s success. Even a brief lapse can create division and confusion. As leaders, we must ask ourselves the following questions—not just rhetorically, but in action:
Have I created a constancy of purpose?
Do I give credit freely and own failure?
Are standards and expectations clear and enforced consistently?
Have I provided my team with the necessary resources to succeed?
Am I invested in my team’s success?
Do I value their contributions and foster growth?
Do I have the courage and integrity to do the right thing when everyone is watching?