This post in an excerpt from our brand new ebook, The Kick-Ass CEO, Part 1: How to Create Inspiring Objectives that Driveyour Company Forward.Download the 29-page ebook in PDF format here.

Accountability

In order to effectively measure and maintain track of the goals, you must establish accountability.

It is common to assign tasks to specific teams, but when you are working on company goals, you want individuals to be accountable for their contribution and responsibilities.

Why don’t teams work as effectively as you might have assumed in the past? After all, isn’t your entire company built upon the foundation of teams?

Actually, no. A company is built upon departments. When you begin to assign tasks to teams, then how do you know who is responsible for each assignment aligned within those tasks? A team leader would assign them to individuals.

As a result, you will have already established a task for each individual. The issue (and where most companies fail in implementing their strategy) is that only teams are held accountable. Make individuals accountable to their personal assignments and monitoring becomes much more effective and efficient.

When employee A is accountable for determining the roads to take to reach point B, then employee is responsible for determining the best route to point C, you’ll find that each one will invest in getting the entire organization to its destination properly.

What about CEO accountability?

The fact remains that while you may be the CEO of the company, and you have plenty or responsibilities already, you need to be held accountable to the goals just as any other employee.

Ask yourself the following questions while you are implementing the strategies (and not just once, but over and over and over):

• Have you communicated the goals effectively?
• Did you paint a picture that everyone can see and understand?
• Are you certain that they understand?
• Are you following up regularly (weekly or bi-weekly) with management to ensure that all tasks are on target?
• Are all facets of the strategies and goals still effective? Or are adjustments required?
• Are you interacting from time to time with key employees?
• Are you reminding the company of the goals regularly and consistently?

While all of the company’s employees need to be held accountable for the success of the short and long-term goals, it’s just as important that you remain held accountable as well.

You may wish to assign a VP or other executive to hold you accountable (for example, the VP of HR can fit this role well). The more people who watch the road, the less likely you are to hit a pothole, or take a wrong turn.

Reinforce the key messages consistently.

Do you agree?  How do you drive accountability in your organization?  Share your comments and insights below!