Jon Rennie has an interesting twist here, in that, the leader is ALWAYS to blame for EVERYTHING. Well, at least the captains in the US Navy are held responsible for ship-wide mistakes. 

And it got me thinking. Is this true of organizational leaders? Or technology leaders in agile contexts?

If something bad happens, we look to the following—

  • The Senior leader

  • Management

  • Teams

  • Individuals

To see who’s responsible for it? I can’t speak for all cases, but only what I’ve seen in my own experience. Typically, the organization and organizational leadership seem to look for the lowest level individuals to blame. With many fingers being pointed in all directions. In other words, I think the “captains” are held accountable in very few cases.

Wrapping Up

And is assigning blame or blaming even the point?

Or is it better to focus on learning what happened (root cause) and on preventing it from happening in the future?  

I’m still mulling this one over from a leadership perspective. I thought I’d share it with you to see what you think?

Stay agile my friends,

Bob. 

Another related link – https://www.military.com/daily-news/2021/11/04/navy-fires-2-top-officers-of-submarine-damaged-collision.html

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