Building up Responsibility in the Workplace Business Strategist Roberto Lico
Building up Responsibility in the Workplace Introduction When team members don't take responsibility for their actions, some managers may just hope that the problem goes away. Others may try to remove these people from their teams completely. Neither of these approaches is ideal – the situation is likely to get worse if you just leave it alone; while laying people off should be a last resort, especially if you're dealing with people who have the potential to be effective team members.
Important! What Causes a Lack of Responsibility? People duck responsibility for reasons ranging from simple laziness or a fear of failure. Whatever the reason, if people fail to take responsibility, they'll fail in their jobs, they'll fail their teams, and they'll fail to grow as individuals.
You can’t escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today. Abraham Lincoln
Your Department and Team Signs of Not Being Responsible I Lacking interest in their work, and in the well-being of the team. Blaming others for mistakes and failures. Missing deadlines. Avoiding challenging tasks and projects, and not taking risks.
Your Department and Team Signs of Not Being Responsible II Regularly complaining about unfair treatment by team leaders and team members. Engaging in Self-pity. Avoiding taking initiative, and being dependent on others for work, advice, and instructions. Lacking trust in team members and leaders. Making excuses regularly.
The price of greatness is responsibility. Winston Churchill
Strategies to Build up Responsibility
Strategy I Start by Talking Your first step is to talk to the individuals concerned. Find out if there are circumstances that are contributing to the situation, or if there are problems that you can deal with. After all, bad things can happen in people's lives, and this can clearly affect their behavior at work. Then provide feedback , so that the individuals know that their behavior needs to change.
Strategy II Ensure Adequate Resources A sensible action is to ensure that your people have the resources they need to do their job. This might include providing training, equipment, access to mentors and coaches and suchlike. This is a key step in helping people take responsibility for their work, since if they don't have the "tools" needed to do their jobs, it's easy to avoid responsibility!
No individual raindrop ever considers itself responsible for the flood. Anonymous
Strategy III
Communicate Roles, Responsibilities, and Objectives Your people also need to know clearly what their job roles and responsibilities are. Make sure that you have an up-to-date job description for each team member, and be as detailed as possible about every responsibility that they have.
Strategy IV
Re-Engage People You take responsibility for your actions, simply because you have a deep sense of pride in what you're doing. The same will likely hold true for your people. Your people will be more engaged if their work aligns with their values. Meet with them to find out what these are. Then, illustrate how their daily tasks and responsibilities align with those values.
I believe that every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity, an obligation; every possession, a duty. John D. Rockefeller
Strategy V
Help People To Take Control Sometimes, people feel that they have no control over their lives. To them, it doesn't matter what they do or how hard they work, nothing makes much of a difference. People who don't take responsibility often play the blame game. When you notice team members starting to point the finger of blame, stop them immediately. Shift their focus away from assigning blame, and, instead, direct it to what needs to be done to fix the problem and move forward.
Strategy VI
Don't Micromanage If you're having problems with members of your team not taking responsibility, it's also worth taking a fresh look at your own management style. Perhaps you aren't delegating clearly, or you're micromanaging them. So, learn the art of delegation, and avoid micromanagement. Give your people the freedom they need to make their own decisions, but be ready to guide them in the right direction if required.
Those who enjoy responsibility usually get it; those who merely like exercising authority usually lose it. Malcolm Forbes
Conclusion To help people take more responsibility for their work, provide them with the skills and resources to actually do their job. Then, set up an environment that makes it easy for them to change, and help them to take responsibility for their decisions and actions.
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