If good happens somebody must have done, if bad happens how we prevent it!

This learning is the hallmark of leaders. Worded in many ways, this takes us away from blame game. High performing cultures are still built on blame game, or to put it in better words – accountability. Accountability is a very good term in forward looking sense and while looking backward when all good happened. It requires great clarity of thought and courage to avoid using accountability in a post-mortem meeting of failure. To keep the discussion focused on learning is known to many but practiced by so few that it needs to be repeated often. But this is only one half of what you want to focus on.

The other half is good. Whenever something good happens, we assume that team members know it and are already feeling great. This is true. But this is also a time when a feedback loop can be reinforced. If you wish to maintain a feedback loop, you need to make the loop stronger, so that it bears the cost of negative feedback that you may provide sometime. It is important to give positive feedback as often as possible. How do you know whether you are giving enough feedback? Well, if for every 1 negative feedback, you give 3 positive feedbacks to your best team members, then you are doing just ok.

But more important is that whenever something good happens, you must stop to think – who would have done that? And then reward those people.

Now some more theory on this. Attribution theory says that if things happen good people think it is because of them, but when bad happens they blame it on the system. So, by pointing out bad things and finding things to blame, people tend to tune off from the system. And that is not good.

So as a leader it is your job to look for good and find causes for it!