Accountability Matters

There seems to be a concept gaining popularity that essentially states we are not responsible for our lives. We are not responsible for our actions, we aren’t responsible for our results and we aren’t responsible for each other.

This space is not big enough to enter into the speculation on where this idea has come from, and frankly, I’m not sure that it matters. What I want to address is how you, as a person who wants to be successful and contribute to the world, has to do to avoid failing victim this type of thinking.

Among youth, I see this trend manifesting in everything from grades, to money, to how they treat each other. While MOST young people are hard working, kind and generous people, there are SOME who walk around with an attitude of entitlement. They seem to think that the world owes them something. They think they DESERVE the iPod, the new car, the trendy clothes and whatever else their heart desires. There seems to be little notion, among this group, that these things come as a result of hard work and are not handed out to anyone who decides they want it.

Adults too, are falling prey to this flawed thinking and the results are serious. As much as we’d all like to blame the global credit crisis on irresponsible big banks, each of us is as much to blame. If we were better prepared to handle changes, it wouldn’t have been the issue it has been. Instead, because people think they DESERVE to have everything they want, they have mortgaged themselves into oblivion, maxed out credit cards, and continued to spend without any regard for what would happen if anything went wrong.

What’s my point? All of these issues should be teaching us a very important lesson about the importance of accountability. One of the universal laws of life is that in one way or another, eventually, we will all be held accountable for how we behave. If we commit crimes, we’ll go to jail, if we overspend, we’ll have financial trouble, if we don’t pay the mortgage, we lose or house. There are consequences for actions. Yet many still try to live in make-believe world where there aren’t.

But what if Instead of living in fear of the negative consequences of bad decisions, we started to live with a focus on the positive consequences of good choices? What if instead of not opening bills in the hopes that maybe they’ll go away, and then having to dig out of a deep hole, we were proactive in managing our money and looked forward to the positive consequence of being debt free? What if instead of dreading the fact that we’re getting fatter (more than 50% of North Americans are now obese) and then stick our heads in the ground and continue to stuff our faces, we made a plan to eat better, move more, and looked forward to the positive consequence of slimming down and being in better health?

So why aren’t we more accountable? Surely most of us WANT to live well, do the right thing, make good decisions and be responsible. So why don’t we; because we don’t make ourselves accountable. It is all too easy in today’s world to avoid consequences. Yes they will catch up with us eventually, but we can evade them for a long time, sometimes years. Witness the thousands of 55-75 year old people still working. Not because they want to, but because they have failed to properly prepare for retirement and have now discovered that they simply can’t afford to. They weren’t held accountable for how they were spending and not saving, until it was too late.

In many cases school works the same way. Students fail to do the work and study necessary to learn what they need to learn, but our school system advances them through the grade levels anyway. Students get the message that there no real consequence for not working because hey, I’ll go to grade 11 next year anyway. And then we wonder why they don’t get it when a few years later, they realize that they can’t operate that way in the workplace.

So what can you and I do to deal with the chronic lack of accountability in our world? Probably not much. But we CAN make ourselves accountable. We can realize that if we ensure that we make ourselves accountable for our actions and our results, that we will end up more successful, happier, fulfilled people. How do we do that?

There are a few ways that you can create accountability in your life. Here are my favourites:

1) Get a Coach: Most people think coaches are only for athletes, or maybe people in the depths of crisis. Nothing could be further from the truth. Most of the successful people I know get coaching in some form or another. They realize that a coach can help them by seeing things they cannot see, giving an unbiased opinion on issues, and most importantly by keeping them accountable to themselves. A coach is a great way to be sure that you execute on the goals you set. Learn more about coaching at: (http://www.MarkBlackSpeaks.com/coaching)

2) Create a Mastermind Group – Gather a few colleagues, friends or ideally people who are even a little further ahead on your path than you are, and get together to talk. Meet once a month or maybe more frequently and keep each other posted on your progress. Share you goals and objectives and keep each other ACCOUNTABLE to working on them.

3) Find an Accountability Partner – Find a colleague or friend who you trust, respect and can count on. Set meeting once a month or every two weeks. Share your goals and plans and the actions you plan to take to accomplish them. When you meet each week, ask each other if you have done what you said you would do.

Whatever you can do to hold yourself accountable to yourself is valuable. When you become truly accountable for your actions and your results, your results will improve.