Accountability. The word alone makes some cringe and others get fired up. I actually can’t believe that this is the first time that I am talking about the concept in this blog because it’s such an integral part of being an effective small business owner. What if you are not good at holding yourself accountable?
Is success over for you?
It is only if you have given up on achieving higher levels of success. We have been talking about time management and productivity which are vital to success. The problem with these and any other system you are faced with is that they are just systems that we plug ourselves into. We are the ultimate drivers of these systems. No system is going to do the work for us. The bottom line is that you are accountable for managing your time and for your productivity.
This becomes a tad problematic for those of us who struggle with holding ourselves accountable. The systems that you use will need to take into account how well you currently hold yourself accountable. If you struggle with personal accountability, not to worry. An often under realized item with regards to accountability is that it is a learned behavior. Most who are great at this practice are that way because they practiced holding themselves accountable.
One straight forward way to improve how accountable you are is to do what you say you are going to do 100% of the time. I mean 100% of the time not 9/10, 99% or most of the time. I mean every time to the letter that you said you would do it. In the great book The Four Agreements, the first agreement is to be impeccable with your word. Do you what you say you will do when you say you will do it. If you have problems with this, don’t commit to specific times to get things done until you can get up to speed. How we handle our alarm clocks in the morning is a great example of where we lack personal accountability. Personal accountability is sacrificed every time we hit snooze on the alarm clock. If you say you are getting up at 6:00am then get up at 6:00am. These are little things but when practiced will change how we handle all of the things in our lives. It seems extreme but sometimes this is what it takes for a paradigm shift. The point of inspiration for you is that if you want to be better about holding yourself accountable, you can do it.
How have you been able to hold yourself more accountable? How have you been discouraged due to a lack of accountability?