Why do people hire a trainer to lose weight and get fit? Why do managers have annual performance reviews and discuss your strengths and improvement areas? Why do some of the most successful entrepreneurs and leaders have a coach to help them reach their vision and goals?
People find different ways to make them accountable and help achieve personal and professional goals. Your trainer, manager, or coach — all are accountability partners helping you make a positive transformation.
Accountability partners exist in different fields but the main question to ask ourselves is, “How do we increase our success rate while having an accountability partner?” Here is a four-step process to ensure you choose the right accountability partner.
1. Have a Positive Mindset
The path to success begins with a mindset change. There is a famous phrase which states:
“You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink” — recorded in 1175, in Old English Homilies.
You can spend as much time and money you want with your accountability partner, but if you are not ready to make a change and jump in with both feet, the odds are this relationship is not going to work. This is also the reason why the majority of new year resolutions fail each year.
People decide to make a change for various reasons. They could be facing adversity, have a trigger event that makes them realize the reality of their current situation, or take cues from their behavior and gather feedback from trusted friends to decide on making a change.
Whatever the case, you need to be ready to make a positive impact in your life and tune your mind to accept help from someone who could help you make this transition.
2. Choose the Right Person
An accountability partner is someone who has a growth mindset, gone through a transformation journey similar to yours or is currently going through one. They can empathize and understand your struggles and is willing to do anything to help you out and see you succeed.
It includes holding you accountable for your actions and keeping it real. To find someone with these characteristics, you need to show vulnerability, ask for help in the right forums and groups, attend events where there are more chances you would meet like-minded people going through the same struggles, and do a lot of research.
This partner could be your close friend as long as they have the characteristics of the right accountability partner. At some point, they should have faced similar challenges to help you out effectively. Their success and failures will be the stepping stone for you to move forward and achieve your goals.
3. Define Rules of Engagement
Once you have a partner, how do you go about holding each other accountable? What should a healthy “accountability relationship” look like?
It starts with defining the rules of the relationship with each other. Discuss the outcome of the relationship, the result you want to achieve with the help of your partner. The worst thing to do is not having a goal in mind. It is like using a GPS to navigate to a destination without the correct address and then complaining about it.
Mutually agree on keeping each other accountable at all times, being open and honest, giving timely feedback, discussing their availability throughout the week, the frequency and mode of communication. Maybe you meet in person once a week or attend the same events for further motivation. Figuring out the rules of engagement is the key to success.
4. Trust Your Partner
The most critical component of an accountability relationship is trust. You need to get used to the fact that if your partner is saying something, it is for your good. Instead of challenging them every time they make a suggestion, try to understand the reason as to why they are saying something and see how it applies in the most optimized way in your life.
This is crucial as the relationship may also involve sharing private information that are obstacles to achieving their goals. You chose this person for a reason, so go all in and make that positive change you deserve.
Do you have an accountability partner?
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Photo Credit: @chrisliverani on Unsplash