John McCain thinks the head of the NSA should resign. Sen. Orrin Hatch blames Kathleen Sebelius for her role in the healthcare.gov debacle, and many think she should resign (Tony Trenkle, the CIO for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, already has). We all want someone to blame for bad things that happen because the one thing you can be sure of is that if you find someone to blame, then it isn’t your fault.
The tendency to assign blame springs from the hard-wired urge to self-preserve. It’s obvious why we do it. If you can make someone else the source of the problem, you keep trouble from darkening your door. This does far more harm than good—to yourself, your company, your reputation, and your stress levels.
That’s because blame is rooted in fear, and whenever you attempt to soothe that fear by accommodating it, you create more of it. Blame not only inspires fear; it spreads it, and like a hot potato, that blame gets tossed back and forth, person to person, team to team, eradicating trust, undermining relationships, and exacerbating the stress and strain caused by whatever happened in the first place.
(Read more about why blame is so tempting.)
I call this the externalizing trap, and it’s one of many which not only make life incredibly stressful, but also contribute to an unstable culture plagued by low morale. When externalizing and assigning blame is your go-to method of coping with crisis, or even minor setback, it puts you and everyone else on the defense. If, at any moment, you believe you could get stabbed in the back or thrown under the bus, you’ll be far less inclined to work creatively or collaboratively. We’ve all seen it poison a business culture.
In order to create collaborative, positive, and productive environments, entrepreneurs, C-level executives, and managers need to create a blame-free culture by supporting and also demonstrating what it means to be accountable. This can be tough to root out, especially in organizations where fear and blame are so deeply entrenched. It can be changed, and it starts with you.
Start with a Shift in Language
You can begin to create change by choosing different words to describe and address the issue.
Consider this: Something goes wrong with a company initiative. You can ask, “Whose fault is this?” and look for someone to blame it on. Or, you can ask, “Who is responsible here, and what is your plan?” Using the term “responsible” creates a shift away from “blame,” and from a game of “not me” to one of empowerment and strategy. Things will always go wrong, but stewardship requires standing strong and devising a plan to move forward.
As for the fear that owning up will add to your stress? Blaming other people for whatever’s going wrong is like doing battle with a Hydra-headed beast—cut off one problem and two more grow back in its place. It’s exhausting.
But when you own up to your role, and encourage others to do the same, you put down the sword and change the game. And in fact, it can be a relief. The practice of blaming others for everything can create a learned helplessness. The sooner you practice being responsible, the sooner you regain control.
Change Up the Blame Game
The next time you feel the urge to point your finger at someone else, especially if you tend to do this all the time, try these steps to begin to shift your company’s culture from one of accusation to one of collaboration.
Hit the brakes. The moment you feel yourself start to finger blame in a moment of stress, pause. What thought is driving you to do that? What are you really afraid of? How valid are those fears?
Take stock. Look at the situation as objectively as possible. What happened, and what could have been prevented? What were the contributing factors? Think of it as understanding, not looking for scapegoats, because part of owning the problem is not blaming your tools
Understand your role. While you don’t “fix” the situation by blaming someone else entirely, you don’t address it by shouldering all the blame, either. When you can acknowledge what your role was, you can think about how to address the underlying issue focusing on what you can do, not just how you look.
Own up. You don’t have to fall on your sword, but you can and should acknowledge what role you and your team played, and offer strategies for what can be done differently. You’d be amazed at what happens when you put more energy into solving the situation than protecting your ego.
Create a culture of responsibility. The only way to encourage this behavior is to make your organization a safe place for those willing to be responsible for or their actions and decisions. Mistakes, oversights—these things happen everywhere, all the time. You’ll be far better off when you reward those willing to learn from them, than those who are more concerned with covering their tracks.
