I wrote a post on the importance of having and how to choose people for your inner circle. Accountability is a benefit of having an inner circle. What is accountability? There’s personal accountability which is accepting responsibility for your life and decisions you make. Michael Hyatt wrote an excellent post on Leadership and Accountability in regards to this topic.
Then there’s living a life of accountability, where others are holding you responsible for your actions. At work, it is your manager. You will have different circles of accountability partners. Your golf partners may not be able to hold you accountable for goals you have in your career. But they can hold you accountable to goals you’ve set with your golf game.
Why do we need accountability? There are 3 reasons for accountability:
- Accountability motivates you – knowing someone will be checking up on you will force you to follow through.
- Accountability makes you better – since results will be checked by another person, you want to show your best side.
- Accountability challenges you to grow – another person critiquing your work gives you a different perspective. Another set of eyes on areas in your life allows you to fill in your blind spots.
There are 3 people in my life that I hold my entire life accountable to. Then with different goals I have, I have another set of accountability partners. It’s great when you find accountability partners in areas you are trying to grow. Remember the relationship is reciprocal; be willing to hold someone else accountable.