The price of greatness is responsibility.
Winston Churchill
Throughout life, whether it be in your career, your family life, or just personally, you will experience failure and mistakes. Knowing that they will come regardless of what you do, it’s imperative that you learn how to handle them. There are a couple common mistakes that are often made and, honestly, only one correct way to handle them. Regardless of age, position, title, etc., you can be a leader and you must be a leader if you want success. As a leader, the only correct way to handle a setback is to take responsibility. If you directly caused the issue, then it is your responsibility. If someone else directly caused the issue, then it is assumed you indirectly caused the issue; therefore, it’s your responsibility. If that seems unfair, it would be wise to heed the adage of my old martial arts coach: “Life isn’t fair, get used to it.” There are also functional reasons that we will address as to why it needs to be your responsibility. What you should not do during a setback is pass the blame to someone else; that is quite literally the opposite of taking responsibility.
You should not let your emotions take control. The general saying goes to listen to your heart less and let logic supersede your decisions. However, emotions aren’t wrong. In fact, if you listen to your heart less, you will eventually become heartless. Author of the 5 Love Languages, Gary Chapman, states, “Remember, emotions themselves are neither good nor bad. They are simply our psychological responses to the events of life.” We need emotions; it’s part of what makes us human and honestly what fuels our drive for success. Emotions are the predecessor to passion and passion moves us to do great things.
If emotions are neither good nor bad and they are necessary, then why are they viewed so negatively? The answer lies in what we do after the emotion hits. Successful people have learned to control their emotions instead of being controlled by their emotions. Average people allow their initial emotions to feed their actions and thus can lash out in anger or fear with verbal tirades, physical aggression, sullenness, or a plethora of other outlets. Emotions aren’t bad in and of themselves, but if we fail to control them and choose to act in accordance with negative emotions, then our actions become wrong.
Here lies the crossroad between responsibility and emotions. A setback can trigger emotions such as fear due to failing, letting people down, not living up to expectation, etc., or anger due to feeling like a failure, not being recognized for the times you did succeed, as a cover for fear, etc. The first step is to take control of your emotions; if you can understand why you have the emotion, it can aid in reigning it in. If you cannot understand why, you still need to hold in your emotion and refuse to act on it. Remember, emotions are just a psychological response; you cannot pass the blame of your actions to your emotions. The responsibility is solely yours.
As a leader you cannot pass the blame to anything or anyone but yourself. Even in middle and upper management, it is common to see people who are willing to blame circumstances, luck, a coworker, a spouse, etc., for a setback. Mediocre people are afraid that a failure showcases their flaws or makes them look incompetent, and thus they seek to push the failure on someone else to protect their reputation, or more aptly, their ego. If you want success though, learn to step up and take responsibility, even if it was only indirectly your fault. Sometimes, too, when it wasn’t your fault indirectly.
Let’s imagine that a self-founded business venture folds, an investment doesn’t pan out, you fail to secure a promotion, a relationship falls apart, or any other failure happens. If it honestly is happenstance, luck, another person’s fault, or another excuse, then what have you learned from it and what can you do about it? The answer is nothing! If it’s not your fault, then your role in the situation was faultless by definition, and you could have done nothing different or better to prevent the negative result. This also means that every time you’re in a situation like this, your best isn’t enough, and responsibility falls to someone else to step up and manufacture a different outcome. This is a passive existence and the road to mediocrity.
Instead of passing blame, choose to take responsibility. Now you hold the power to induce change, right the wrong, and drive for success. When your business venture folds, it’s not luck that caused your business to flunk, it was your misunderstanding of the market and your differentiation from competitors. What can you do? Educate yourself on the market, find the consumer need that is unmet, and then watch your business grow. Instead of thinking senior management made a mistake in not hiring you, which leaves you waiting for someone else to “not make a mistake,” assess whether your numbers weren’t as good as the person hired or your leadership abilities weren’t on par with the new position. So, what can you do? Increase your productivity, network with senior management to learn the skills they are seeking, state your desire, and drive to secure the next promotion.
When you take responsibility, even when it appears to be unrelated to you and your decisions, it gives you the power to change the outcome. Instead of being a slave to circumstance or the abilities of others, you control your destiny. Success isn’t luck, it’s manufactured. If you follow President Truman’s motto, “The buck stops here,” you are choosing to step up, accept responsibility, and become the harbinger of change and improved results. If instead you stoop to passing blame, then you forfeit control of the situation to someone else and are stuck waiting for luck or for them to change your circumstances.
Your success is your responsibility and because so many people are willing to pass the blame or shirk off responsibility, their success is also your responsibility. This is great though. As a result, growth, success, and your dreams are within your reach, not at the disposal of someone else. When failures, setbacks, or obstacles present themselves in your life, claim them. If they are a result of your direct decisions, then it’s only right that you own up to them; if they are a result of someone else’s direct decisions, then you gain control of the situation and you will become known as the person who rights wrongs and gets things done.
Don’t let someone else be in charge of your destiny. No one is dreaming your dream or has your exact capabilities. You alone can control your future. Let your emotions fuel your passion, but don’t hand them the reins. Let yourself take responsibility and therefore control. Your future, your dreams, your success are your responsibility. Now go do it!
Forward Notions 