Two primary responsibilities of leadership are selecting people to join our team, and routinely evaluating each team member’s performance going forward from the date of hire.
These past several weeks, we have been discussing eight key characteristics for selection and evaluation of personnel, including 5 character qualities: Available, Faithful, Teachable, Enjoyable, Responsible; and 3 technical capabilities: Administrative, Communication, and Technical skills. Thus far we have discussed the first four attributes: Available, Faithful, Teachable, and Enjoyable.
Today we are providing a bit more detail on the fifth attribute: Responsible.
The quality of being responsible includes a person’s individual ability to “own” leadership in the context of their assigned role: Does the person have the capacity to face issues and exercise good judgment?
A person who is responsible demonstrates a willingness to confront issues appropriately and only when necessary (remember that “to confront” means “to face;” whereas “to affront” means “to offend.” There is a difference. We purposefully selected the word confront when seeking to accurately define responsible). Facing issues certainly does require facing the person (or people) who created the issue; it is simply important to hire staff team members who will do so in a style that gets the issue face-up and on the table; as opposed to the recipient emotionally face-down, taking on ice-cold water faster than the Titanic.
Additionally, the term responsible assesses a person’s judgment: Are they a discerning person; one who demonstrates good decision-making processes? It is important that each member of the team understands the impact of their individual decisions on the other members of the team. A good individual team member will have the judgment necessary to realize that they are in fact a member of a larger team and try to swerve to avoid the potholes that could impede the momentum of their co-workers.
Responsible: the ability to face issues and exercise good judgment. A person who demonstrates this characteristic, together with the other 7 criteria, will be a welcome addition to any organization.
In the weeks ahead we will continue the discussion of the remaining technical capabilities listed above. We have found that this comprehensive set of analytical tools constitutes a clear methodology for assessing candidates for employment and then, for those who are hired, evaluating the effectiveness their on-going performance.