Responsibility
Have you ever been in a situation where you had the responsibility to accomplish a task but did not have the authority that goes along with the responsibility? Most of us can answer that question in the affirmative. Having responsibility is the duty or obligation to act.1 Taking responsibility is acknowledging and accepting the choices you have made, the actions you have taken, and the results they have led to. True autonomy leads to both having responsibility and taking responsibility. Taking responsibility is fulfilling your role in life. Responsibility is an essential element of integrity; it is the congruence of what you think, what you say, and what you do. Responsibility is essential for reciprocity, trust, and for maintaining honesty.2
Definitions3
1. Having a duty or obligation to act.
2. Acknowledging and accepting the choices you have made, the actions you have taken, and the results they have led to.
3. Able to meet commitments made to yourself and others
4. Keeping the promises you make.
5. Doing everything you say you will do, or have led others to expect from you. Do what you say.
Honesty
Honesty is vital to making effective changes and identifying who you are and what you want. Being honest is critical at every level of your life, not just with yourself. When you are dishonest, you are effectively saying that the only way to get things out of life is to lie or cheat. In this modern world of marketing spin and half truths, maintaining honesty might be seen as a bit of a challenge. But in reality it is not difficult, we always know at a fundamental level what is right. Being honest does require a high level of self-discipline and is often difficult to do at first because we have all gotten so used to those little lies and pretenses that seemed to make life simpler. The good news is that with practice being honest gets a lot easier, especially when you realize that others start to identify your authenticity, and their respect grows accordingly.4
Integrity
Integrity is not a theory or philosophy it is concrete and real; it is efficient and effective. Acting with integrity is doing things right especially when no one is looking.5 There are four components to integrity: personal convictions (what we believe), stated values (what we say we believe), operational values (what we actually do), and ethical principles (what we should do).6 Integrity is a quality of character demonstrated by the moral commitment and courage necessary to maintain consistency between what we believe, what we say, what we do, and what we are morally obliged to do. In other words, are your actions different from what you say? Do you say one thing and then do another? John Wooden said, “If you don’t have the time to do it right, when will you have the time to do it over.” You have the time to do the right thing and you can choose that path.
Take a moment to think about your personal convictions (remember these are what we believe). Now that you have your personal convictions in mind, think if they are the same as your stated values (what you say you believe). Go beyond these stated values and try to determine if you follow through and put your stated values into action; this is your operational values. This should bring you to your ethical principles, which is what we should do.
Personal Responsibility
If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn’t sit for a month.
—Theodore Roosevelt
What is personal responsibility? It is taking conscious control of your responses to the events and circumstances in your life. You are responsible for yourself, whether you like it or not. What you do with your life and what you have done already is up to you. While you may not be able to control everything that happens to you, you are nevertheless responsible for how you think, act, and feel in response to those things.7 Personal responsibility is the willingness to both accept the importance of standards that society establishes for individual behavior and to make strenuous personal efforts to live by those standards.8 But personal responsibility also means that when individuals fail to meet expected standards, they do not look around for some factor outside themselves to blame. The demise of personal responsibility occurs when individuals blame their family, their peers, their economic circumstances, or their society for their failure to meet standards.9 There may be no more impactful thing you can do for yourself than to take responsibility for your life. There are benefits of accepting personal responsibility.10
Some of the benefits of accepting personal responsibility are freedom, respect, and trust from those around you, and fewer negative emotions. Freedom can manifest itself by allowing for personal development in general. By acknowledging your role in the process, you give yourself the opportunity to improve. When you accept personal responsibility, you gain the freedom to create your life, anyway you want it.11 Let’s say you make a mistake while working on a project at work. If you admit your mistake, people are more likely to believe you about other things you do. Your word has more meaning to other people when you take responsibility. But it’s not just a matter of trust. You also earn lots of respect when you take responsibility for your actions.12 There are all sorts of negative emotions that come with not accepting personal responsibility. When you blame others, you may feel anger or resentment toward that person. You will almost invariably feel guilty or ashamed. I call this the “nose picker syndrome.” If you catch me doing something I know I should not be doing, like picking my nose, the first thing I do is get mad at you (I blame you) then I feel guilty and angry with myself because you caught me doing something I know I should not do.
What does all this have to do with being a better follower and in turn becoming a better leader? If you take responsibility for your actions, you will become more of an asset to your boss. The boss will come to realize that you are someone upon whom he can count on. You need to make a conscious decision to become that person responsible for the decisions and actions you take. But you cannot just say you have decided to take personal responsibility, you have to make true by taking action. Accept responsibility for who you are right now. It’s not other people who made you the way you are, but only your thoughts and actions. Sure, many of those thoughts and actions were conditioned into you by your family, society, friends, or other external influences. But it is you alone who had the thought or performed the action. And it is you alone who must take responsibility for them. You do not need to be happy with your situation or your life as it is; you just need to accept yourself and the fact that you are the one who got yourself there. While negative circumstances may have had a significant impact on you, and you may have experienced huge amounts of social conditioning, dwelling on them or blaming others won’t help you improve your situation. Only through accepting personal responsibility can you move forward.13
Here are some actions that help in the process: recognize your choices, take the blame, and accept yourself and your circumstances.14 Recognize that you always have choices, and you should accept responsibility for the person you are. It is not other people who made you the way you are, but only your thoughts and actions. Many external forces condition our thoughts; these forces can come from our family, friends, or society as a whole. But you are the person making the choice, and you must take responsibility for the action. Remember, the choices and decisions you have made have allowed you to be found in the circumstances you find yourself in today. Dwelling on your choices or blaming others will not improve your situation; only through accepting personal responsibility can you move forward.15
Suppose you make a mistake while working on a special project for the boss. If you admit that mistake to your boss, you will garner respect from the boss and your coworkers.16 Your word now has more meaning as the result of taking personal responsibility for your actions. But it not just a matter of trust, you also earn respect in this manner when you take personal responsibility for your actions.
There are many negative emotions that come with not accepting personal responsibility. When you blame others, you may feel anger or resentment toward that person. You will almost invariably feel guilty or ashamed. The worst part about denying responsibility is an overall sense of powerlessness. When you feel like you don’t have control over your life, you can easily become depressed. You need to make a conscious decision to become the sole person responsible for your life, and you need to make that decision now. But you cannot just say you have decided to take personal responsibility and then have it be true. Surrendering responsibility is a habit that you need to remove, and here is how.
You have to recognize that you have choices.17 At any given time and in any given situation, you have a choice of how to respond. It does not matter how dire your circumstances are. You could be locked away in an extraordinary rendition prison, but you still control your mental state. You can choose to focus on something positive, no matter how negative a situation you find yourself. Resolve from this point forward you will look at the choices you have available to you instead of feeling constrained.
As a result of having and taking advantage of your choices, do not be afraid to take a risk or make an important decision. Remember you did not ride a bicycle the very first time you got on the thing. When you learned to walk as a young child, you toppled over a few times. So do not be afraid that you are going to crash or mess up. Just keep thinking about what the results might be if you do not take responsibility for your actions. So, when there is a problem, do not ask yourself who is to blame. Instead, ask yourself: “What could I have done differently in order to get the results I want?” When you ask yourself this question it may inevitably lead to you coming up with answers to simple or complex problems, in other words problem solving.