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Elevate Your Work and Relationships Through Conscious Accountability
Results and relationships—managers and leaders no longer have to prioritize one over the other to build a culture of exceptional accountability. You don’t have to choose between being the hard-charging task master and being the easy-going people pleaser. By expanding your awareness to create deliberate intentions, take informed actions, and be responsible for your impact, you can achieve better business outcomes and experience greater satisfaction in doing so.
In Conscious Accountability, Yale professors, psychologists, and leadership consultants David C. Tate, Marianne S. Pantalon, and Daryn H. David invite you to think about yourself and your working relationships more completely and integrate a practice of conscious accountability in your daily life. A forward-thinking approach to realizing organizational and team goals, conscious accountability can help you move beyond traditional ways of engaging with your employees, team members, and peers. The impact will be transformative.
To help you develop the skills and the mindsets of conscious accountability, this book introduces a straightforward and powerful CONNECT framework that gives you the tools you need to better relate to everyone in your professional (and personal) life, build trust, and motivate yourself and your colleagues for greater outcomes. Step up your game by following the seven practices of conscious accountability—creating clarity, opening up engagement, nailing it, noticing, exchanging feedback, claiming it, and trying again. You will connect more closely to others, put people in a position to succeed, elevate and distinguish yourself, and generate excellence everywhere you turn.
“Conscious Accountability presents a profound concept, beautifully described. If you want to be a better leader or have a better life, read this book to gain timeless wisdom uniquely positioned to help with today’s challenges.”
—Amy C. Edmondson, Professor, Harvard Business School; Author, The Fearless Organization
"This insightful book offers a fresh look at accountability. It will help any leader in any organization deepen relationships and improve team performance.”
—Daniel H. Pink, New York Times bestselling author of The Power of Regret, Drive, and When
“In this important new work, the authors explain why accountability is about more than efficiency—it's at the core of healthy relationships. Conscious accountability is not a way of checking boxes, but a way of being human.”
—Douglas Stone, Co-Author, Difficult Conversations and Thanks for the Feedback
“We don’t often think of happiness and accountability as complementary terms. But Conscious Accountability makes an artful case for reimagining accountability so that it works not only in achieving our goals but also in strengthening the bonds with our colleagues and communities.”
—Emma Seppälä, Author, The Happiness Track; Lecturer, Yale University
“Conscious Accountability is a brilliantly written, must-read for any professional. The ultimate how-to guide for accelerating valuable outcomes, this book offers a highly practical framework for moving to the next level of influence, no matter your level of experience. The authors also illustrate how practicing conscious accountability can create a positive force for change in the world.”
—Geetu Bharwaney, Founder and CEO, Ei World
“Conscious Accountability is a must-read for any CEO or leader. To turn dreams into a successful business you have to create an outstanding work culture—which means getting accountability right. Relatable anecdotes make it easy to read this book and absorb the concepts, plus it's packed with actionable tips and exercises. A fantastic resource!”
—Julia Pimsleur, Founder and CEO, Million Dollar Women; Author, Million Dollar Women and Go Big Now
“Conscious Accountability makes a tremendous contribution by showing us how accountability can be an inclusive practice—one that connects us to people, missions, and organizations. As we wrestle with new forms of work, political turmoil, and the uncertainties of a global pandemic, chapter-by-chapter this book frames awareness, intention, and the practice of accountability as tools we can use to incentivize ourselves and our teams to do our best work.”
—Kerwin Charles, Dean, Yale School of Management
“Perhaps more than ever, all organizations need to embrace a new way of considering accountability—one that elevates the power and importance of relationships in ensuring a sustained and successful way forward. Conscious Accountability moves beyond a transactional, product-driven approach by showing us how to build self-reflective, humanistic skills into our leadership practices. Every leader needs the lessons this book has to offer.”
—Linda Mayes, Arnold Gesell Professor of Child Psychiatry, Pediatrics, and Psychology; Director, Yale Child Study Center
“Build the team, communication style, and efficiency you’ve dreamed of for your company with Conscious Accountability! As experts in leadership development, David, Marianne, and Daryn will teach you step-by-step how to create cultures where accountability to your work and team can thrive.”
—Marshall Goldsmith, Thinkers50 #1 Executive Coach; New York Times bestselling author, Triggers, Mojo, and What Got You Here Won’t Get You There
“The COVID-19 pandemic created unprecedented disruption in communities, organizations, and the lives of countless people. Conscious Accountability offers engaging and clearly written guidance for getting back on our feet and for creating a new era of productivity and work satisfaction.”
—Robert M. Kaplan, Clinical Excellence Research Center, Stanford University School of Medicine
“Conscious Accountability offers a way of thinking and acting in our relationships—with colleagues, family, friends, and self—that promises to help us accomplish meaningful things together and build better relationships. The authors use stories, illustrations, and exercises to share practical wisdom and wise practices for experiencing accountability, not a means of control or being controlled, but as a humane exchange in which we help one another live up to our aspirations.”
—Ruth Wageman, Founder, 6 Team Conditions
“Conscious Accountability is a powerful must-read for anyone wanting to take their management, leadership, or organizational effectiveness to the highest level. The book offers a practical framework for applying a proactive approach to accountability in the complex, evolving leadership landscape.”
—Scott Drozd, CEO, FCP Euro
David C. Tate is a licensed clinical psychologist and an assistant clinical professor in psychiatry at Yale University in the Yale School of Medicine and a lecturer in the Yale School of Management. His areas of practice in organizational consulting include coaching and leadership development, conflict resolution, team building, succession planning, and promoting healthy organizational development. David is a co-author of Sink or Swim: How Lessons from the Titanic Can Save Your Family Business. He earned a certificate in family business advising from the Family Firm Institute and serves as the facilitator for the National Association of Corporate Directors Connecticut Chapter’s Family Business Roundtable. He also is the co-founder of the Connecticut Consulting Psychology Group.
Marianne Pantalon is a licensed clinical psychologist and executive coach. She is the co-founder and COO of the Center for Progressive Recovery and a senior facilitator at the Interpersonal and Group Dynamics Program at Yale University School of Management. As the chair of the CT Psychologically Healthy Workplace Program, Marianne enjoys promoting the growth of psychologically healthy practices in the workforce of Connecticut. She is also an experienced instructional designer.
Daryn David is a licensed clinical psychologist, educator, and leadership development coach. At the Yale School of Medicine (YSM), Daryn is a core faculty member of the National Clinician Scholars Program and an associate research scientist at the Yale Child Study Center, where she designs and implements innovative leadership development curricula. Across departments, Daryn provides leadership development coaching to YSM faculty members and teaches several courses focused on interpersonal relationships, teamwork, and effective leadership. She also delivers leadership development programming to the Yale Greenberg World Fellows and coaching within the Women’s Leadership Program at the Yale School of Management.
Introduction
Part 1. A Different Approach to Accountability
Chapter 1. Rethinking Accountability
Chapter 2. Becoming More Aware
Chapter 3. The Power of Conscious Accountability
Part 2. CONNECT: The Seven Practices
Chapter 4. Creating Clarity
Chapter 5. Opening Up Engagement
Chapter 6. Nailing It
Chapter 7. Noticing
Chapter 8. Exchanging Feedback
Chapter 9. Claiming It
Chapter 10. Trying Again
Part 3. Implementing Conscious Accountability in Real Time
Chapter 11. Putting It All Together
Chapter 12. Challenges to Implementation
Chapter 13. A World of Conscious Accountability
References
Index
About the Authors