Shared Accountability: How Does Your Team Measure Up?

Have you ever been on a delayed flight, forced to stressfully sprint to your connecting flight? The one thing that would have helped most is if passengers without tight connections let you exit the plane first—but no one followed the crew member’s request on the matter.

I’ve been there many times. But recently, I witnessed something different—a flight attendant who took a new approach in this exact scenario that solved the chaos and benefited everyone involved.

As leaders, I believe we can learn from his approach and apply this strategy to boost shared accountability within our teams.

• Read the video transcript

  A few months ago, I was on a flight that was delayed, and of course I had a tight connection I needed to make. So the stress was there.

  And as we were coming in to land, the flight attendant announced to all the passengers that some fellow passengers had tight connections. And so if you didn't have one, if you could just sit and let others off the plane first, that that would be helpful.

  Well, what do you think happened when we landed? Nobody listened to that. Everybody got up and was ready to get off the plane, so it didn't help anybody with tight connections.

  Now, just recently, I was on another business trip and, same thing, although this time I was not one with a tight connection. But we were delayed, and as we were coming in to land, this flight attendant got on the loudspeaker and started listing off connecting flights and said, if you are on one of these flights, I want you to raise your hand and keep your hand raised. And so he went through and read all these connecting flights. And you know, about a quarter of the folks on the plane had their hands raised.

  And he said, okay, I want everybody to look around and see whose hand is raised. These people need to get off the plane first. If your hand is not raised, please stay in your seat and allow these other passengers to exit as quickly as possible.

  And guess what? People listened. There was shared accountability created, such clarity in who needed to do what, and then that shared accountability -- so powerful.

  So if you are leading a team and you're feeling frustrated with the lack of ownership that's being taken, with people not acting on the things you're asking them to do, I would ask you, first of all, are they crystal clear on what's expected of them, on what's needed? And then two, have you done anything to create some sense of shared accountability across the group to help elevate commitment and performance from all the folks involved?