HOW TO BUILD A CULTURE OF ACCOUNTABILITY IN THE WORKPLACE

Do you feel like some of your employees have an attitude of non-accountability? Do they have a habit of dodging responsibility when projects fail to report positive results?Here is how you can build a culture of accountability in the workplace.

Before we start, why is accountability so important?

Employees feel more responsible for their work when someone is accountable for the outcome of a task. It encourages consistency in how work is carried out and it inspires people to work together as a team.

When employees feel like they are accountable for their actions, they put more thought into their work and this benefits the end result (i.e. sales, profits, leads, etc). More workplaces are creating a culture of accountability to help ensure all projects and tasks are carried out successfully and meet the expected deadline.

One of the main reasons some people avoid accountability is because they're not sure what targets and responsibilities they have in the first place.

When you don't have any particular targets, it's hard to be motivated to excel and it can naturally discourage responsibility.For employees who don't have clear job roles or responsibilities, they may feel like they can't commit to tasks 100%.

By having clearly defined roles and goals, people will feel like they should be more responsible for their actions.

Prepare targets for all members of staff. These goals should not be designed to exhaust employees or push them past their limits but give them a specific goal to aim towards. When they meet their monthly/quarterly targets, they will be proud of their achievements and feel more responsible.

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For every department, there should always be a chain of command.

This chain will help clarify who is in charge of certain roles and responsibilities so there is always someone who can be held accountable. It's easy to avoid blame if you're not included. In a working environment, there should always be someone accountable to help ensure everything is running smoothly and rectify problems when they arise.

You can easily create a sense of leadership by providing a diagram which highlights who is responsible for each team. This is useful to have in an office because if someone needs to talk to a more senior employee, they will know exactly who to talk to by looking at the diagram.

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You can build a culture of accountability in your workplace by rewarding people who work hard.

When you feel like you're rewarded for your hard work, you naturally want to work even harder and tell people you're the one whois responsible.

Offering rewards encourages employees to be more passionate and invested in the work they do. Rather than doing a 9 to 5 job, they are working towards a specific goal and they know if they surpass expectations, they will be rewarded too. It's also a great way to increase morale in the office.

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Be an example, be accountable.

If you want to create a culture of accountability in the workplace, you need to be accountable for your actions too. You cannot expect people to be responsible and own up to mistakes, if you cannot accept responsibility.

During meetings, share your results with the team and be accountable for them. If you think there can be improvements made, talk about them.

You can only create a culture of accountability if you're willing to lead by example.

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Preparing to hire new staff? Want to build a business case to hire?

When it's time to hire new employees, you need to build a business case. Contact our team to find out how we have assisted other clients in doing this – enquiries@cubiqrecruitment.com  

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