Ownership

Ownership is something I value as a critical character trait. Admittedly, I took too many decades to come around to this idea. Like many kids, I quickly said, "It wasn't me!" or "I don't know!" when any idiot observing could clearly see it was me and I did know. But I felt it was my way of deflecting ownership and mitigating the consequences coming my way. Over and over, I would use this tactic when I had not been caught red-handed. It worked from the point of avoiding the worst of some consequences in the short term, but in the long term, I was eroding trust and relationships.

Once I came to grips with the fact that the short-term pain of owning my mistakes led to my own growth as a human, faster restoration of relationships, and quicker resolution of the issue, I worked to change my habits. It is still easier to try and avoid the inevitable immediate disappointment, but knowing the benefits of admitting my mistake, I now default to honesty and openness. The usual response to someone owning their error is one of acceptance, appreciation, and problem-solving. It is always embarrassing to be caught making a mistake, but it is even more devastating to adamantly deny something only to be found guilty later. The amount of arguments I could have mitigated or avoided if I had just owned up in the first place is way bigger than I would like to admit.

Former Navy Seal commander and now best-selling author, speaker, and consultant Jocko Willink quite literally wrote the book on Ownership. He states, "Ownership happens when failures are owned, egos are forgotten, and pride is set aside." The opening paragraphs of this post speak to the first phrase in Willink's quote. "Egos are forgotten, and pride is set aside" speaks to the other side of ownership.

In trying to save our own hide, we quickly throw someone else in the path of the oncoming train. We choose this to not have to admit we made mistakes and have our reputations will be damaged. That does not change the fact that mistakes were made, and the truth will come out. Then, reputations are destroyed.

On top of that, the solution to what went wrong is likely faulty since the full picture of the true problem cannot be seen. The downstream effects of making decisions from bad data can become disastrous. The wrong programs or people can be eliminated or initiated. People's lives can be permanently changed for all the wrong reasons. The guilt of this only compounds the initial mistake.

The other side of ownership for leaders is not taking credit for their team's success. That praise needs to go to the people who worked on the solution. When a leader owns a team's success without crediting the team, they alienate their best people. Those people will no longer want to be a part of the team, and the team gets weaker with each defector. The leader becomes isolated, in which case they are no longer a leader. Or they are leading with the wrong people because the right people won't work with them, and their victories will become fewer and fewer. Either way, the leader is destined to fail.

Own the bad to take heat off the team, and praise the team for the good. This builds trust, a following from others, and a continuously improving organization. Any leader who doesn't strive for those outcomes is no leader I want to associate with.