How responsibility drives personal and professional development

“[He/she/they] “What is good for making excuses is rarely good for anything.” – Benjamin Franklin

” [person] “Whoever complains about the way the ball bounces is probably the one who dropped it” – Lou Holtz

“Wisdom comes from personal responsibility. We all make mistakes. Own up to them… learn from them. Don’t throw away the lesson by blaming others.” -Steve Maraboli

At the starting of my profession I made mistakes. Many of them. It wasn’t out of malice or purpose, it was simply inexperience. Everyone makes mistakes in their profession and personal life. This is a part of the learning process and, truthfully, the only way you possibly can make certain that you’ll eventually succeed. Truth be told, it isn’t the mistakes that count. It’s the way you react to them. Your inner monologue will little question inform you to elucidate yourself, shift blame, and minimize your involvement – with the goal of limiting the damage and emerging unscathed. I’ll inform you a little secret: it’s the worst thing you possibly can do.

Apologizing is difficult, vital… and vital

How many times in the last week, month or 12 months are you able to remember saying “I’m sorry” to someone for something you probably did? What was the response? There are simply very few indignant reactions to someone who truthfully and reflectively says “I’m sorry.” It evokes remorse, but also appreciation. Confirmation of failure. Action confirmation. Confirmation of a poor result. And remorse for the same reason. It can immediately mend relationships and mean you can move forward and grow. This also defuses the situation.

Trying to elucidate will only make the problem worse

However, trying to elucidate your failures causes exactly the opposite response. Every time you explain why something wasn’t your fault, it becomes easier to exhibit why it was. Every time you place blame on another person, it opens the door to more direct criticism of your actions. Furthermore, I think you’ll find that each time your deviations are redirected towards you, they may change into more intense, more indignant, and more prone to have a negative personal impact on you.

An apology represents personal responsibility and a show of strength. Blaming others is simply opening a window to your weakness.

However, personal responsibility is very difficult. It requires a critical look at yourself. This requires looking failures in the face and asking how and why they happened. This needs improvement. Rejection, on the other hand, simply requires you to make an excuse, whether it’s true or not. There is no need for any reflection here, there is simply an overwhelming desire to bury the problem and move on. The problem is that you’ll likely go on to failure again because without critical reflection you just won’t strive to enhance.

There are easy but vital ways to practice personal responsibility

So how can these ambiguous theses be turned into motion? There are many ways:

• In all the things you do, take pride and put in the effort: If you do not care or you are going to half-finished a task, find something else to do, whether it’s a personal or professional project. The only technique to consistently avoid failure is to involve everyone in what you do. Pride displays. Laziness and apathy also play a role.

• Ask for feedback and accept negative: Everyone desires to read a review and hear only praise. And, truthfully, it’s easier for a boss to spotlight the good things than to lament the bad things. Because of this, leadership failures often occur during these meetings. It’s great to listen to what you probably did right, but it’s absolutely vital to learn what you didn’t do. Before any feedback session ends, you might want to ask yourself, “What can I do better?” The answer won’t ever be “nothing” and you’ll improve because of it.

• Look critically at your work: Step outside of yourself and ask, “If I were someone else, would this impress me?” This is difficult reflexivity. That said, if you place pride and effort into your work, you will probably answer the query with a resounding “yes.”

• Never blame others: Let’s remove the problems with unfair bias and/or personal vendettas. The truth is, if the blame was placed at your feet, you most likely had something to do with it. Accept and take responsibility. Say you are sorry. Promise to do higher. Then go get higher. I assure you that when you do this, you’ll feel some discomfort. I also promise that the discomfort might be shorter and less painful than it should be if you begin to show away from blame, even if it is justified.

• Trust others and be a good person: When you trust others and treat them well, you’ll find that you just are not alone when mistakes are made, and you’ll rarely be the goal of blame from those that do not practice personal responsibility.

• Learn from those around you who are personally responsible and ignore those that are not: Being personally responsible is difficult. But the better of those around you’ll show you the way. They might be leaders in your professional environment. Imitate them. Ask them questions. And when you see them continuously blaming themselves and attempting to absolve themselves of their mistakes, ignore them. They won’t be here long.

To be honest, possibly it’s because I’m getting older, but for me it’s clear that personal responsibility is decreasing. Perhaps in the digital age and with the increase in distant work, it is simply easier to disregard and hide our mistakes. But “running away from something” is not running away from something. Karma is real and I think you’ll find that it comes back with a vengeance. On the other hand, fulfilling your personal responsibility will almost at all times stand you in good stead. I have made many mistakes in my profession and I can clearly say that I only succeeded because of failure.