Responsible

I’ve been having a lot of conversations lately with myself (yes, I know) and others about being responsible. Often times the word responsible is used to assign blame:

  • “Who was responsible for that bug?”
  • “So and so is responsible for the data leak that led to your data being shared”
  • and so on

However, being responsible is actually a position of power and freedom. We should want to be responsible, because that means we control the outcome. Even if we don’t control 100% of the outcome, we always control how we act and react in a given situation, and no one can take that away.

I’ve spent the last year or so, at the end of every morning journal, writing the following sentence: “I am responsible.”

Regardless of what I’ve written above it about how the previous day went or what I’m struggling with, I remind myself that it starts and ends with me. And then I get back to work.

Maybe you’re struggling with your product launch, or how to grow, or raising money, and the talk track in your head is “It’s not my fault. They just don’t get what we’re up to” or some variant thereof. The good news is that you are responsible. No one owes you anything. No one. So get to it.

I highly encourage a couple of books around this topic: