Ok… I got it now. I understand this whole “taking things personally vs taking personal accountability thing!”
First, let me tell you a short story. It’s based on very real people.
This past weekend we moved our offices. And, as guilty as I feel about saying it, I did very little to make the move happen. One of my colleagues at EMG, who had been helping me every step of the way, made it her mission to make this move successful.
She, and another colleague that handles much of our IT load, have been working tirelessly for weeks on every detail of this move.
They have located and hired the movers.
They inventoried the furniture.
They hired the electricians to code the locks on the doors.
They ran the contest to pick the conference room names.
They hired the dumpsters to take away the trash.
They marketed and sold our old furniture.
They went through stuff at the office, throwing out all that was unnecessary.
They inventoried the office supplies.
And, they spent hours upon hours this weekend making sure everything was up and running, boxes where in the right places, etc., etc., etc.
In short, they took this move VERY personally. They made it their mission. They defined themselves by its success. And, they also took personal accountability to figure out what they needed to do to make it happen every step of the way.
They are working their butts off, are in a weird way having fun making it happen, and they are energizing the people around them.
So, is taking things personally a bad thing? Is defining who you are by your situation a bad thing?
Read on…
1. Taking things personally and taking personal accountability are two completely different things…. DEFINITION.
As we have been discussing, taking things personally means defining who you are by the things that you do, and it can fill you with confidence and pride and it can cause you to be defensive. Taking things personally means becoming emotionally connected with the outcome of your efforts in a certain situation or initiative.
Taking personal accountability means holding yourself responsible for the outcome of your actions, and it means leading execution with rationality and reason and engaging your efforts in every possible constructive way to see the situation through to a positive conclusion.
Taking responsibility or accountability for things means rationally doing everything possible to ensure a positive outcome in a certain situation or initiative.
2. Like many other realizations in the pursuit of harmony, the question is NOT WHICH IS BETTER, taking things personally or taking personal accountability for things?
The QUESTION IS – How should we best engage ourselves in situations to ensure the best possible outcome? How do we engage in situations to achieve the greatest harmony?
It is important to understand – we can take things personally in a constructive way and we can take things personally in a destructive way. Not taking things personally, is like the ZERO on the graphing scale. The opposite of taking things personally CONSTRUCTIVELY is taking things personally NEGATIVELY.
The two mindsets are independent of each other – though they certainly have influence over each other.
So there are four combinations…
COMBINATION 1: UNCONSTRUCTIVE VICTIM: Take things personally negatively AND NOT take personal accountability for things.
This is the least desirable behavior from ourselves, our colleagues or our family member. In this combination, we look for people to blame for when things don’t go right, but we do nothing to make them right ourselves. They don’t look at data. They don’t analyze data. And, if data is presented to them they reject it – or work to find blame from it. We not only don’t work to find how we can add value, we create negative energy around us through our tone and our desire to blame others for where things are not working.
COMBINATION 2: DISLIKED MANAGER WITH CONSISTENT RESULTS: Take things personally negatively AND take personal accountability for things.
This is a hybrid with good news and bad news. The good news is that this person typically gets results. They get things done. Bad news is that they blame others in the execution. They do not share the credit when things go right (and blame blame everyone, including themselves, when it goes wrong). While the tone of the data analysis can be divisive and negative, they make good decisions on prioritization and do more than their share to make the project successful. They often take more than their share of the load to a fault. These people, or people in this behavior set cast a very negative shadow (even when things go right), and they do often get things done. People don’t like working in this environment and attrition happens over time.
COMBINATION 3: OVER CONFIDENT TEAM WITH INCONSISTENT. Take things personally constructively AND NOT take personal accountability for things.
This is the other hybrid. It’s not as good as Combination 2. This person tends to be a little over confident. They don’t evaluate the data they receive effectively. They over-value the positive. They take credit and give credit for what is going right, but success of their situations is less deliberate and often happens through leadership of someone else on the team. Their results are less consistent than the person in combination 2. People generally tend to work in this environment but become frustrated by the inconsistent results and the lack of direction setting.
COMBINATION 4: WINNER – WINNER – CHICKEN DINNER!!! Take things personally constructively AND take personal accountability for things.
THIS IS THE TICKET! This is someone who is passionate about the situation / project AND executes with rationality and reason. This person defines themselves by the success or failure of the initiative, but stays rational through the analysis of the project, making good decisions as to priorities and taking their fair share of the load. Their personal engagement with the project is contagious and energizing to the team. They react well to the data around them – they analyze both what is going well and what is not. Success is more than just a job, it’s why they exist. And, they are fair and balanced and intelligent in their execution.
I can feel when I am in combination 4 in different moments. I can sense how my level of taking it personally engages the people around me. When I take it personally, I notice others do as well. And, I keep myself rational - trying to demonstrate the best possible personal accountability that I possibly can. I am the president, that means that EVERYTHING is ultimately my responsibility. If ANYTHING goes wrong, I should be looking really hard at HOW COULD I HAVE PREVENTED THIS FROM HAPPENING. I have the ability to modify more of our company than anyone else - so if anything goes wrong, noone has more responsibility nor more opportunity to step in and help than I do.
So, my initial question was wrong. It is not an either / OR situation.
Taking things personally can be energizing, engaging, empowering, OR it can be divisive, demotivating, and dysfunctional. They are two ends of the same spectrum.
They are independent mindsets – AND they play off each other.
ONE OF THE KEY THINGS THAT MAKES TAKING THINGS PERSONALLY CONSTRUCTIVE IS THE PRESENCE OF TAKING PERSONAL ACCOUNTABILITY AT THE SAME TIME!!! It is the behavior and mindset of taking personal accountability for things that allows us to be discretionary with the emotions that we apply in defining ourselves with the outcome of the situations.
When I started thinking about this, I didn’t know what ideally was best in achieving harmony.
In my gut, I thought that taking things personally was inherently bad, and I was struggling to figure out WHEN to take things personally? My sense was to be very selective.
But, the concept of harmony is that we exist in the moment and we create harmony in the moment. And, every moment has a nucleus which is the IS of the moment.
I believe that WE ARE WHAT WE DO. IT DOES DEFINE US. And, we all realize that we cannot be perfect in every moment. And, we all want to succeed or win versus fail or lose.
WE ARE WHAT WE DO in the moment.
EMG defines a part of me. My role at EMG defines a part of me. Being a father defines a part of me.
There is micro harmony that is me in the moment, and in the moment I am my words, my tone, my actions…
And there is MACRO harmony, that is me over time, over many combined moments, and in a collection of moments over time, I am my moments, my tones, my behaviors, my accomplishments, my failures, my actions…
So, I am my actions in the moment, and over time I am my results.
We accept that we can be imperfect in the moment, and for a life of harmony we must be able to find success over time.
We accept that we can fail in any moment, and for a life of harmony we must be able to find success over time.
TAKING LIFE PERSONALLY is what makes Donald Trump, for all of his faults, so very engaging.
Yes, half the stuff that he is saying sounds ridiculous or incendiary, but everyone is listening and everyone is energized (I know that is a polarizing example – but you can feel how much he takes it personally).
But, I would argue, he is not taking enough personal accountability for his actions.
I am so very appreciative and in awe of these two women that have made our move possible this weekend. Aside from doing an amazing amount of work and helping us get ready for what will be a fantastic new chapter in our companies history…
They have helped me understand the power of both… taking things personally and holding ourselves accountable.
When it came to taking things personally, I was throwing out the baby with the bath water. Taking things personally constructively means giving the initiative more meaning and purpose. It raises it to a higher level. It doesn't HAVE to come with the negative side affects of defensiveness and close-mindedness. If you can harness the power of personal accountability you can then leverage the power of defining yourself by your actions.
Harmony requires GRIT. It requires sticking with it moment after moment. Whoever you are, or whoever you are working with, you might fail here and there. You may find yourself in any given meeting, or in a single conversation taking something personally in the wrong way. It happens to me often.
And, no one moment defines us forever. It’s collections of moments that define us over time.
We are imperfect, and we must accept our failures on any given moment.
And, we must stay personally accountable for our lives and our harmony. We must objectively assess our results, or lack thereof, in whatever situation we are attempting to navigate…
And, based on our assessments, based on the data of what we see resulting from our behavior, we must figure out how WE can modify our behavior, our mindset, our communication, our prioritization… to achieve the end that we seek.
HARMONY delivers success and happiness…
And, taking things personally in a constructive way combined with keeping a rational personal accountability for our actions and our lives is the BEST possible way to face every day…
It’s AND not OR.
I am how I act. I am what I do. At least in the moment. And, I am the product of my actions over time. I am my results. And, I am my potential. And, the extent to which I embrace personal accountability and the rational and emotional intelligence that it demands, then I am the most constructive and powerful version of myself...
It’s HARMONY… learning from every moment.
Yours in it and, now, I am taking it personally every step of the way!
Nestor