Blame vs. Accountability: How Leaders Can Respond to Problems
The difference between blame and accountability was clear in a moment I described when I first published this post in March 2025. A CEO, standing on a stage in front of hundreds of employees, pointed to a fellow C-level executive and said:
“If anything goes wrong with this initiative, that's the person to blame.”
I did not hear it as a joke. The CEO was assigning fault for a possible failure before the initiative had even produced a result. Naming an executive to lead the work would have been reasonable. Announcing who would be blamed sent a different message.
I cannot know how everyone in the audience interpreted the comment. My concern was what it might teach people to expect when they needed to report a delay, ask for help, or challenge the plan.
Blame and accountability are different leadership behaviors
Blame focuses on assigning fault. Accountability includes clear commitments, an honest explanation of what happened, and responsibility for the next action. It should help people address a problem and reduce the chance of repeating it.
A leader can ask someone to explain a missed commitment without humiliating them. The useful questions include what they understood the commitment to be, what got in the way, what they communicated, and what help they needed. The answers may reveal a mistake, an unclear expectation, a resource problem, or a decision that needs closer examination.
Shared accountability does not mean nobody owns anything. An initiative still needs people responsible for decisions and follow-through. The CEO also has responsibilities: setting priorities, making resources available, resolving conflicts, and responding when the people doing the work identify a risk.
What blame-based leadership can teach a team
If someone expects to be singled out publicly, they have a reason to protect themselves. That might mean documenting why a problem belongs to another department, delaying bad news, or avoiding an uncertain proposal. Those are possible responses to the threat of blame, not evidence that employees lack commitment.
Changing “they” to “we” will not fix this by itself. People need evidence that raising a concern leads to a useful conversation. A leader who says “we are a team” and then leaves one colleague to absorb all the criticism has not changed much.
I encountered plenty of blame during my time at GM in the 1990s, although I did not interact with the CEO then. In this account of a local leader blaming the board for his behavior, I describe another way responsibility gets passed along. It is worth examining what leaders can change within their own authority, even when they face pressure from above.
Respond to a missed commitment with an investigation
Consider a hypothetical project that misses its launch date. Before concluding that the project leader failed, ask whether the deadline changed, whether the team had the necessary capacity, and whether dependencies were understood. Ask what the project leader knew and when they raised concerns. Their decisions matter, and so do the conditions under which they made those decisions.
Then agree on what needs to happen next. Someone might need to revise a plan, clarify a handoff, or escalate a resource conflict. Identify who will take that action and when the team will check the result. Without follow-through, a respectful discussion can still leave the original problem unresolved.
This is also why I caution against assuming a cause before investigating it. “The project leader was careless” is an explanation to examine, not a finding established by a missed date.
Psychological safety supports accountability
Psychological safety matters because people need to be able to report a mistake, disagree with an assumption, or admit that they need help. Those conversations give a team information it needs to meet its commitments.
That does not require excusing every action or lowering expectations. An unintended mistake and a deliberate decision to conceal a problem call for different consideration. We need to understand what happened rather than assume that every disappointing result proves misconduct.
For more on this subject, listen to my conversation with Amy Edmondson about psychological safety and The Fearless Organization. I also discuss why calling a mistake “stupid” can make the next conversation harder.
Start with the next concern someone brings you
When a colleague reports a problem, notice your first response. Ask what they are seeing before offering a judgment. If you helped create the problem through an unclear priority or an unrealistic commitment, say so and explain what you will change.
The executive on that stage could have been given clear responsibility for leading the initiative, along with a clear commitment of support. That would have left room to discuss obstacles without first deciding who would take the blame.
Read a free preview of The Mistakes That Make Us
My book explores how people and organizations respond to mistakes and turn them into learning and improvement. Read a free preview to see how it approaches accountability and leadership before deciding whether it is right for you.
[…] Why Great Leaders Share Responsibility Instead of Throwing Others Under the Bus: Amen to that! We’ve all worked for the latter type of boss – or will at some point. Great read. […]