final paper fixing

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Abdussamet Akca

Accountability in leadership is very key for personal and professional growth in every leadership rank. Accountable leaders are leaders who are very responsible for everything that is taking place in an organization and are answerable to the management and the employees on all actions and activities that are taking place in the organization. Building accountability in leadership requires organizations to exercise some very challenging exercises such as solving mediocrity and unaccountability in other leaders. However, many organizations have found it very challenging to fully address the problem hence becoming a major weakness. Most of the time attempts to address and build accountability in leadership have always been undermined due to the failure of organizations to take action against weak and ineffective leaders. Failure to address accountability brings a lot of consequences within an organization because it sends a message to the employees and the management that they should be well prepared to in tolerating unaccountable leaders. When organizations fail to address the issue of accountability, then work performance and morale of other accountable leaders and employees go down thus derailing the company’s performance and productivity of the employees.

In the year 2015, Lee Hecht Harrison (LHH) did a partnership with Human Resource People Strategy (HRPS) so that they could explore the state of accountability in leadership in some companies in North America. It was the first research study of its kind which aimed to do exploration in the leading state in companies. Over 250 people were surveyed and were senior executives of human resources across all the target companies. The collective responses that were received from this survey were loud and clear. The research revealed that the gap of accountability among leaders is real, very pervasive, and should be addressed as soon as possible. 

From the survey, almost three quarters (72%) of all the people surveyed had a response that accountability in leadership is a pressing issue in their organization that needs to be solved. Despite the perceived importance, only 37% of the people surveyed were contented with the kind of leadership accountability in their organizations (Molinaro, 2015). Following the overwhelming response and need for accountability, the research was expanded to study and survey companies in South America, North America, Asia, and Europe. The findings of this global study provided more than just findings of the pervasive accountability issue. It did reveal practical measures organizations can take to deal with the accountability in leadership by tightening their own gaps and terms. 

Upon analyzing the findings of the expanded global surveys, the findings and results were very dramatic. The results were almost the same. Three-quarters of the global survey participants (72%) also revealed that the accountability issue in their organization was very sensitive that needed an urgent resolution and measures. Only 31% were very satisfied with the level of accountability demonstrated by their leaders (Molinaro, 2015). Another exercise was done separately among people who had a strong belief that their organization had s strong degree of accountability to check on the most common behaviors of their accountable leaders. From the research the respondents replied that accountable leaders are people who have good communication skills and behavior with his/her colleagues, tackle very tough issues, and making difficult decisions, they tend to minimize unhealthy politics, capacity building of leadership among his constituents. Besides, accountable leaders set standards for a high level of performance and then hold others responsible for and accountable for high-performance standards (Molinaro, 2015). Lastly, they hold maximum respect for their colleague and always motivate others to work constructively as they display clarity about the external trends in the environment of business. 

Accountability depends on organizational practices focused on building strong leadership. Organizations or industries leading to high-level accountability ensured that they educate their leaders on what matters first. The overall management is very strict to relent on mediocrity and accommodate unaccountable leaders placed leaders on a check to always perform accordingly. 

Reference

Molinaro, V. (2015). Driving leadership accountability: A critical business priority for HR leaders. People and Strategy, 38(3), 32.