Accountability

So how do you make sure that those 'pesky workers' do their job right?

A colleague once asked me, 'So how do you hold them accountable? What are you going to do if they don't do what they are supposed to do? Are you going to discipline them?'

This wasn't even about value-adding tasks, but filling out paperwork correctly. The questions themselves display the wrong mind set.
Same thing along the lines of having to 'Inspect the Inspectors'.
Who do we trust in the end?

In my mind, accountability is not achieved by controlling/inspecting people's adherence to rules or assigned tasks, and enforce punishment on non-conformance. This obviously leads to fear (which unfortunately is still a widespread management style) and completely shuts off an employee's creative thinking and willingness to contribute outside the box.
The employee will wait until told, do exactly as he/she's told (even if they know a better way), and ask a supervisor's advice/direction before doing anything about non-standard/non-routine situations.
In this climate, you don't want to be blamed for trying.

I've seen a lot of people get really good at 'looking busy'. If you're measured by how much 'effort' you put in, why would you want to reduce that level of effort through process improvement? (That's of course if you had the authority to do anything about the way you do your job in the first place). It's scary when effort matters more than results.

And the managers are not letting go either. Why would they want to give up their self-defining and job-securing 'duty' of coordinating the work of (or rather FOR) their people on a daily basis? If employees all of a sudden started to think on their own and achieved outcomes without daily directions, what would happen to the poor manager? All of a sudden, he is 'not needed anymore'.
In this environment managers do not want to improve processes and procedures to make things easier. In their mind (and potentially in senior managers' minds), it would make them 'obsolete'.

They do not realize that 'making things easier' is everybody's job. To work yourself out of your job, is the best achievement you can have. Yet, in most cultures, you'll not just end up out of work, but out of a job entirely.

The right attitude has to start at the top of the food-chain. If the top dog does not lead this way, there is no way that the young pups will go anywhere.

So doing the right thing inherently gets you in trouble in such cultures. Like Drucker said, 'Most of what we call Management consists of making it difficult for people to get their jobs done'. He wasn't merely referring to adding bureaucracy or stove piping departments, but also to the underlying mindset of managers having to justify their existence.

I know a plant manager who almost fell victim (and still might) to doing the right thing. He forged a team (out of dysfunctional ruins) that was able to run a manufacturing department even when he wasn't there. Including handling all kinds of things that go wrong here and there.
Senior management ended up asking at one point, 'Do we even need this guy anymore?'. They wouldn't even give him credit for where he got that department. He got paid for what he did, right?
Who wants to develop a strong, high-performing team in such an environment? Raise your hand!

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The recipe for Accountability is Ownership.
No, we don't have to transfer legal ownership to every employee (although it helps). But the employees need to feel that they have authority over their 'world' to achieve the (clearly communicated) results that are expected of them.

Empowerment is an overused, often misapplied, and misunderstood buzz word in the management world, but employees need to have the tools and freedom to get the job done. In most cases it is not managers conferring power to their reports, but simply letting go of exerting too much power on them.

Employees simply need a clear direction, communicated goals, expectation of results, and a defined set of performance standards. THIS is what managers are supposed to be working on. NOT the challenges their employees are having. If the employees cannot solve their own challenges, then the manager has failed to grow them enough and give them the right tools to do their jobs.

A workforce with a sense of ownership is committed and pro-active. A culture of (the right kind of) accountability is a competitive advantage.

Let me end with a Deming quote: "Plants do not close from poor workmanship. Plants close from poor management."