What Role Do You Play?
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What Role Do You Play?
When working with leadership teams on the Accountability Chart, I often find that the concepts of Roles, Tasks, Accountability and Responsibility sometimes gets confusing.
What's the difference between filling a Role in a seat vs doing a task? like The Role of Accounting vs tasks like QuickBooks entries? and why does it matter?
Why does it matter who is Accountable vs who is Responsible? (It is called an accountability chart after all)..
Here is one way to explain this..
We all play many different roles in our lives. I for one play the role of Mother, Wife, Sister, Friend and EOS Teacher, Facilitator and Coach. In my role as a mother I am accountable for tasks like food prep, laundry, housekeeping, budgeting etc.
In order for me to be the best at every role I play, like being an Implementer - I must manage my time effectively and delegate tasks that can be done by someone else, like my housekeeper.
She is responsible for laundry, general housekeeping, making sure to alert me when we are out of supplies or essentials. etc.
Ultimately, I am accountable at the end of the day for my kid's wellbeing. If my kids come home to a messy house and no dinner they will be grumpy at me - which will make my role as a mother, harder.
Responsibilities can be delegated while Accountability cannot.
Steven Covey, author of many effective habit books says that accountability breeds response-ability.
In other words, it is the leadership teams that are the decision makers and held accountable for decisions and outcomes.
Managers oversee that the tasks gets done, triggering a response from the employees that have the skills and ability to complete the tasks.
Responsibility refers to the obligation of performing the tasks and applying to the rules; Accountability implies answerability for the outcome of the task or process.
Hence, Leadership + Management = Accountability.
Great leaders know how to Simplify, Delegate, Predict, Systemize and Structure.
Managing is overseeing those responsible to execute tasks which is the ultimate accountability!
The RACI model illustrated here is a helpful cheat sheet when building your accountability chart and for every day leadership decision making.
Learn more about me and the work I do here https://www.eosworldwide.com/rachel-lebowitz
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