YES! This is a key message that I shared with clients whose job it was to create innovation. The problem was that company cultures are often focused on accountability, which of course always comes with consequences. The last company I worked for had accountability as one of its primary values, and an inordinate amount of time was spent on accountability processes. Good grief!

Ownership is a higher level mindset. It’s a “want to” mindset vs a “have to” mindset. Guess which mindset results in greater productivity and innovation? It’s so obvious, yet it seems so elusive to managers, partly because it’s seems less structured and quantifiable, thereby thwarting accountability.