How to Hold Your Team Accountable Without Being the Bad Guy | Katie Armentrout

Holding your team accountable without feeling like a micromanager is tough. No one wants to be the boss who’s constantly checking in, chasing deadlines, and fixing mistakes. But when accountability is missing, your team underperforms, and you end up carrying the weight of their unfinished work.

In this episode, I’m sitting down with Katie Armentrout to break down the biggest mistakes leaders make when trying to hold their team accountable, and how to avoid them. We’ll talk about why setting clear expectations isn't enough, the role your own leadership habits play in team accountability, and how to correct problems before they turn into bigger issues.

If you’ve ever felt frustrated by missed deadlines, unclear communication, or a lack of follow-through, this episode is for you. Let’s get into it.

Episode Links

• Connect with Katie Armentrout 

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• Listen to: Are You Great at Your Job, but Not So Much With the People? 

• Take the Four Tendencies Quiz (Gretchen Rubin) 

• Learn About Working Genius

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

• How to hold your team accountable without creating resentment
• Why accountability starts with YOU, and how to model it effectively
• The key to setting clear expectations so there’s no confusion
• Why people resist accountability and how to shift the team culture

When you finish listening, I’d love to hear your biggest takeaway from today’s episode. Take a screenshot, share it to your LinkedIn or Instagram stories, and tag me @desireepetrich so I can say thanks.

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Transcript

Desiree Petrich (00:02.072)
All right, friends, I'm here with Katie and I'm very excited for the structure of this episode. We're going to do things a little bit differently because between Katie and I, we have had a lot of questions coming in around this topic of accountability. In Katie's sense, I got the feeling that it was maybe more people are asking you how to hold other people accountable. But for me, it's how do I hold myself accountable? So we're going to look at this from.

both directions in this kind of frequently asked questions format. So Katie, I'm excited for you to share your expertise and I want to jump right in. So what if someone were to come and ask you why as a leader can I not get people to do their jobs?

Katie Armentrout (00:43.598)
Yes, happens every day. I was looking at my calendar for the day and right after this, there, have a call with the team and they're like the number one issue is accountability. So yes, very common question. And so I talk about like leadership in general, it's three things. It's what we practice. It's what we permit and it's what we promote.

Desiree Petrich (00:45.774)
haha

Katie Armentrout (01:09.613)
And someone much wiser came up with us, but you know, when we say it's, what we promote, it's, we want it to be what we say and only what we say. It's much like parenting. Like just do what I say. We know that it's also what we practice. It's more caught than taught. It's what we do. But what we never talk about or really think about is that leadership is also what we permit. It's what we tolerate and it's what we allow. And this is where accountability comes in.

is as a leader, wherever you're at in the organization, it is your job to hold people accountable. And that means first you have to set a standard, you have to set the expectation and you have to be really clear about it. when someone comes to me and they're like, hey, people aren't doing their job. My first question is, I share like the three P's, practice, permit and promote. And then I say,

where you have to start with yourself first. So before you start pointing fingers at other people, it's essentially like you ask someone to do something and they either didn't do it or they did it very different than you expect. Doesn't even mean it's wrong. It's it's different than what you expected. And so I walked them through a couple of questions and I said, first, look to yourself and like, did you set a clear expectation in the first place?

Desiree Petrich (02:25.536)
Yup.

Katie Armentrout (02:38.178)
And that means, did you assign it to someone? Like just basic, like were they even aware that they needed to do this? So first question, did you assign it? Second, were you, like again, were you clear on the outcome with them? Like not necessarily telling them how to do it, but were they very clear on like, this is what to do? Is there a process that you documented somewhere that you can kind of compare it to?

Because if not, it's not, can't really blame them if you didn't do step one, which was clearly set an expectation. So that's where I start with leaders. And usually when we dig into that, they can realize, oh, I didn't do X, Y, or Z in that area. And so my guidance is get that set up. Like set the clear expectation. And then when you have that set, then it's a people problem.

Right? Like it's either process or people. So if the process is intact and they didn't adhere to the clearly outlined process, then you have something with the person. Okay. Why now? Why didn't you?

Desiree Petrich (03:48.61)
Yeah, it's very interesting that you say this. I always say that leading by example is the number one thing that a leader has to work towards in setting that example, not only talking the talk, but walking the walk. But I also have to take a moment to recognize that I don't have that hard of a time setting boundaries, whether you're looking at disk and I'm an ID, you're looking at working genius. you know, if regardless of which area of these personality or productivity assessments you look at,

I'm not typically someone who struggles setting boundaries. Other people are. And so I think giving ourselves a little bit of like understanding of who are you at your core? Which of these three do you typically struggle with the most? And which one do you need to really focus on? Might be an interesting practice for a leader who feels like they're not fully grasping what it means to set someone up with that clear, clearest kind, right? Brene Brown.

that clear understanding, not leaving things open to interpretation, even though it sounds nice. It sounds nice to say whenever you get a chance or however you think it needs to look. Those sound nice and it sounds like you're giving a lot of freedom to the other person. But if that person wants boundaries and they want something a little more tactical, you are setting them up for so much stress. So recognizing that in yourself and others is going to be huge in those relationships, too.

Katie Armentrout (04:44.461)
Thank you.

Katie Armentrout (05:12.897)
Yeah. And the other thing is that if you are a leader and you are, where, I mean, where you had said, you're like, I don't have an issue setting boundaries. If you're a leader who does, so this also goes onto the, team, right? The people who report to you is to start with a personality test, any personality test, working genius does this, disc does it, but it's also understanding your leader. So if I report to you and I know you don't have,

Or let's say you do have an issue setting boundaries. Well, if I don't, then it's my job also to ask clarifying questions. So it's, I'm not trying to blame the leader, but as the leader, I say, look to yourself first. And the second is that this is part of trust on your team. And I encourage the people who work for me, I'm like, hold me accountable too. Like it's not a one way street, it's a two way street. So if I say do X and you're unclear about it,

it's up to you to ask me those questions to drive clarity. So I always, I say, I kind of tweak Wayne Gretzky's comment of you miss a hundred percent of the shots you don't take. I'm like, you also like don't have answers to a hundred percent of the questions you don't ask. So if the manager and leaders often like we try to get, we think we're being clear, but there's two people in this or multiple if it's a team. So if you're not clear,

before you're set off to go deliver on this, make sure you get clarity on your ask those questions along the way, because that's also your responsibility too, is you can't just wait till it's the deadline and not do it and then go to your leader and be like, well, you didn't tell me X. Like that's not a good method either. So both parties are really in charge of like giving clarity and then also seeking it if you don't feel that you have.

Desiree Petrich (07:07.906)
Right. And I'm assuming that the majority of people listening to this podcast are people who are a middle manager of sorts, which just means that they have someone who's leading them and they are leading other individuals. So just like you said, it's not only important to know as the leader how to do these things, but as the person who's being led to be able to kind of guide their leader. Right. It's that leading upward or 360 degree leadership, whatever you want to call it.

being able to do it in all different ways and coaching others on how to then do it for the people they're leading because it's a trickle down effect. It's something that you can't just say you have to do it and you have to teach it to.

Katie Armentrout (07:50.35)
Yeah. And it's really easy for us to sit on this podcast right now and talk about it. It looks very different in practice. Cause again, I mean, go with like good intentions, like assume good intent that your leader isn't trying to, they're not, or your team, like there are people generally aren't out to get you. Like I think I'm being clear and I try really hard, but if I'm not, then it's like, it's totally fair to ask questions and call me on that and ask for more.

Desiree Petrich (07:53.961)
huh.

Katie Armentrout (08:19.095)
So, but I think so often we aren't, as leaders, we're not really trained in how to have these tough conversations and how to give and receive feedback. And depending on your personality, you might think this is a tough conversation. And some people don't, but some people look at it as like, gosh, they don't feel comfortable. Like they look at that as really confrontational and it's not confrontational. It's just, again, getting clarity so you can do your job.

to the best of your ability.

Desiree Petrich (08:49.89)
Yeah, I love that you almost called us out on that, that it's easy to sit here and say it and to talk about what the practice looks like, but to not actually be having it or doing it in real time. It can look really different. And for me, I'm actually someone that when I work with my assistants or bookkeepers, I say something along the lines of I don't really care what the outcome looks like because I want you to use your creativity and I don't have anything in mind. And to someone else that might seem like, well, you're not

doing what you just said to do. And in the back of my head, I probably do have expectations for it, but it's also a lot about getting to know the person that you're leading. It really is about kind of building that relationship, building that trust so that you can understand each other. You can call each other out when you know that there is something that's not being said or they're expecting you to read between the lines. So it's it's all trial and error. It's all try and fail and try again.

And success is never something that in my opinion we're reaching towards because there's always going to be a different version of it between you and I and everyone else.

Katie Armentrout (09:58.766)
Yeah, it is a lot of trial and error and really understanding the people on your team. And, you know, the other thing that I see a lot is when there's, when there's lack of accountability, there's also a lot of gossip. And, you know, in one situation too, this leader, she had said, she felt like her company was a revolving door.

Desiree Petrich (10:12.898)
Mmm.

Katie Armentrout (10:25.921)
like just constant, there's a couple of them that I've dealt with, that I've worked with like this where, and it's not really, like they just have really high turnover. And I was like, at some point it's like, here's what I would say what accountability can look like. Like they would hire people and then within a couple of weeks they would be gone. And so here's what I, you know what I told them. I'm like, accountability starts in the hiring process.

So when you think about practice, permit and promote, what are you permitting in the hiring process? here was my recommendation just to get really tactical. set expectations in the hiring process. So if I'm gonna announce on LinkedIn that I'm hiring, I'm gonna say, I'm hiring, go to this link, fill it out. And I would add an instruction where, hey, don't reply to me.

Like don't DM me, don't email me. If you're anyone who emails me or DMs me about this, like you will be disqualified. Go to this link and fill this out. I've done this at a previous company and I was shocked at how many people DMed me, like emailed me. And I was like, you've just shot yourself in the foot. Like you're showing like you can't follow, like as an applicant, your applicant is showing they can't follow simple instructions.

And so as a leader, if I put this instruction out, like go to this link to apply, don't do X, but do Y. And then I hire someone that didn't follow instructions from day one. And then a week later, I'm shocked that there are, whenever I hire them and then I'm shocked that they're not following instructions. Like, it's just, it's a different way to look at it. It's a, know, rather than like

Desiree Petrich (11:52.769)
interesting.

Katie Armentrout (12:20.941)
blaming the applicants, right? Like you, that's what I mean where it looks very different in practice. know, another one you can do with hiring is like tell people to like upload a, you know, a 60 second video. If it's 61 seconds or more, be very clear. Like if it's 61 seconds or more, you will be disqualified. Like you will not move forward in the process. And I had a leader try it and she said, well, my, like my best friend, I was having issues with my best friend who she hired. And I'm like, well,

Did your best friend like follow the process? She's like, well, no, cause she's my best friend. I'm like, so right there, there's entitlement. Like, oh, I'm your friend. So I don't need to follow that process. I am above it. Right. She didn't say that with her words, but she's saying that with her actions. And again, you, as a leader, if you can't hold your people accountable, whether it's your friend, a family, a lot of work with a lot of family businesses,

And then whoever you're hiring, have to like that's part of being a leader is stepping into that territory. And if you're afraid to hold people accountable, you will never have accountability in your organization. I could go on about it, but

Desiree Petrich (13:31.34)
I like, no, it's good. love the passion. And I love that it's, you you said it's what we permit. It's what we tolerate. And if you tolerate those things over and over again, eventually it's going to get to a point where it's too hard to even hold someone accountable after that because is it the seventh time? Is it the ninth time that they don't, you know, do what they said they were going to do or what you asked them to do? It's like, at what point then do you hold them accountable?

Katie Armentrout (13:56.642)
Yeah, and it becomes part of the culture. So all of those things, what you say, what you do and what you tolerate become the company culture. It becomes the culture, or if you're in a really large organization, it becomes the culture of your team. You train people how to treat you. So I guess when my first question back, like going back to the beginning of, what do you do if someone says, my people were struggling with accountability and people aren't doing their job?

And I said, well, I always go back to, well, look at yourself first and show me how are you holding people accountable and what are the consequences if they don't. So if you go through the process, you set the expectations, you do all the things and they're still not doing their job, then what are the consequences of that? Like what happens? If nothing happens again, then you're like shooting yourself in the foot.

Desiree Petrich (14:51.406)
Mm-hmm. Just going back to the top here when we were talking about personality assessments, I was working with a church and the pastor was really struggling to get things to the executive assistant on time. And she's like, he's the boss, he's the pastor. I don't want to ask him. I don't want to make him feel bad. I know he's busy. And so I tried to tame things down a little bit. And I said, have you guys ever done the four tendencies? I don't know if you've ever heard of the four tendencies quiz with Gretchen Rubin.

And it essentially explains how do people respond to expectations. So someone who is an obliger, for example, needs that outer accountability. They need the hand holding. They need the constant pressure to be held accountable. I think their tagline is you can hold me accountable and I'm expecting you to hold me accountable. so knowing that versus a questioner, which is another one of these in the framework.

They hate to be asked questions. As long as you've explained it to them and it makes sense, they're going to do it. And they're going to do it by the time they told you they would do it. But they don't want to be questioned. They don't want you to continue asking about it. And then there's rebels like my husband who don't like Taylor Swift simply because she already has too many people who like her. You can't really ask them to do anything. They're going to do it on their own time. So it's it's just another one of those frameworks where it seems so simple.

But if you understand that about people, you really can tailor the way that you're leading into understanding how they need you to hold them accountable. So I'll put the link to that quiz. It's free and you can do it with your team. It's a super fun and easy assessment. But that's something that I always use, especially when it comes to accountability of are we holding them accountable in the right way?

Katie Armentrout (16:23.33)
Yeah.

Katie Armentrout (16:36.418)
Yeah, I love that. And because I also recommend too, just it all comes down to like having a conversation, either if it's one-on-one, if it's a certain employee that isn't holding the standard, or if it's just, you could always start fresh. Every day is a new day to start fresh with your team and say, this is how it's been in the past. This is what we're going to do moving forward. But it always just starts with a very open and vulnerable conversation. So you need vulnerability. And then I would recommend have a tool.

in there. So like the four tendencies, like working genius does this really well. mean, desk, any of the assessments, but have a tool or a framework with you to help people know like what we're following. That's like, it gives everybody common language and you can go back to it and say, like, I know working genius really well. And so I would say, well, Hey, I'm, I have discernment and enablement. I don't have galvanizing. And so

but I know you do. it just gives you a way to like have conversations and understand each other better. And then you can attack the problem and not attack the person. So.

Desiree Petrich (17:44.258)
Yeah. And I would almost throw this in there. I was reading Adam Grant's book, Hidden Potential, and he talked about this concept of bore out, how people don't have enough expectation and accountability put on them. And then they feel like they're just a cog in a wheel doing things over and over again with no actual responsibility. And that can get really boring and frustrating and life sucking. And so it might be that you're not putting enough on that person. You don't know unless you ask, though.

So I love all this. I'm looking through my frequently asked questions that we were gonna use and we've already answered most of them in a roundabout way. No, it's amazing. I love it so much. There's one more and then I wanna flip the script a little bit. But we talked about the processes a lot and we talked about what it looks like to have to set a boundary, but how do you then hold someone accountable on the people side if they didn't meet that boundary?

Katie Armentrout (18:20.737)
What is not happening in our conversation?

Katie Armentrout (18:39.854)
you have to get first of all you have to tell them you have to get and this is where depending on your personality this is a tough conversation for some people this is a tough conversation for a lot of people I love the one-minute manager by Ken Blanchard or the new one-minute manager it's just a really simple framework of when it's a people when it's a people problem

then again, you sit down and it's a one-on-one conversation. And first you want to seek to understand and you want to make sure that you're doing it timely. So this is not let all of these issues build up for six months and then nail them with a laundry list of things they've done wrong in the review. And they probably don't, you know, like an annual review or semi-annual review, and then they don't remember it. It's really important to address each issue while it's small.

address the paper cut while it's fresh, right? Like take care of each little paper cut. And that will, when you do that, it'll prevent more. So if someone isn't, I share this example a lot when I first started at one of my companies. I was doing, was like a hazy ritual. The newest person on the team had to do this crazy report and it involved like this massive Excel spreadsheet of data and I had to run macros on it and spit out a weekly report.

Long story short, one of the macros was wrong and I didn't realize it because I was so new. didn't realize I was reporting our share wrong. I sent this out to like 30 people, like four up, like not quite the CEO, but like president group president did this for eight weeks, eight weeks. So eight times I sent out this report. And then finally my manager pulled me aside and was like, you know, Katie, if I approach things like you, I would be a failure.

not the right way to do it. And I was like, are you talking about? And he's like, your share report has been wrong for eight weeks. And I said, well, no one told me.

Katie Armentrout (20:44.686)
So not only did I look like an idiot, Like, and so that's what I, if he, if someone, anyone, anyone had addressed it, any of my teammates, my manager, like, yeah, I was wrong, but clearly like, you know, this is where I go back to assume positive intent. If I'd known it was wrong, then I wouldn't have done it that like kept doing it that way. And so finally he cut, approaches me in the wrong way. Totally frustrated, but

Desiree Petrich (20:44.952)
Yep.

Desiree Petrich (21:09.752)
Right.

Katie Armentrout (21:14.445)
Now, this was probably like 15 years ago, actually longer. And now I look back at that and it's like, well, where was he in that process? Like telling me, like he should, if he noticed it on week one, he should have told me on week one or week two or someone else.

Desiree Petrich (21:30.286)
Right. And that story you just told almost just gives me like hives because how many times have you seen that something like that happens? And then imagine he comes and fires you because you've been doing it wrong for eight weeks, even though he knew from week one that you were doing it wrong. And I've I will raise my hand and say, I've done that. I've fired someone without ever holding them accountable to the point where they maybe didn't even know they were doing something wrong. And so it's not kind to

try and be kind about it. It's not kind to sit back and watch it happen and hope that it will change. You truly do have to say something in the moment to, and like you said, assume positive intent that they are not intentionally trying to cause harm or mistrust or gossip or whatever it is that they're doing. Assume that if they knew what was happening, it would get better. If it doesn't from there, you then have a stepping stone to say, okay, now we've done this, now let's try this, as opposed to just getting to,

Katie Armentrout (22:00.75)
Yeah.

Katie Armentrout (22:21.324)
Right.

Desiree Petrich (22:28.182)
eight weeks or six months later and saying, okay, you're done, this isn't working.

Katie Armentrout (22:32.31)
Yeah, yeah. I use it's funny how I like keep using that example. I've shared it, but I mean, with teams and clients, I share that because it's also like, where was everyone like, yeah, I was committing the mistake. I was making the error. But I didn't again, I was so new, I didn't have a frame of reference. I didn't realize I was doing it. And and so that's one of those things where it's like approach the person because

Now, had he told me on week one, I would have been like it was awkward and I would have been embarrassed. Yes. Week eight, I was mortified. What? Yeah. And just because again, everyone was seeing this and that's another thing about the culture of that team and that organization at the time was like now the top group president who was getting that and knew it was wrong again,

Desiree Petrich (23:06.338)
and probably a little angry.

Katie Armentrout (23:27.285)
I don't know. I don't even know how my manager eventually approached me with it, but maybe that group president said, you know, to my manager of like, she's doing this wrong and it's not on her. It's on you. Or, you know, like the, the, the mentor, the coach that had been assigned to me on the team, it's on them too. Like, why didn't you, like, again, why didn't anybody tell me? And it's because they didn't want me to feel bad. They didn't want to hurt my feelings or they thought I didn't know any better. So,

Desiree Petrich (23:41.102)
Yeah.

Katie Armentrout (23:56.748)
The other thing that I will just say real quick about feedback is if when you don't give someone feedback like that, you are giving up on them. You're saying it's not worth my time to give you this feedback. You're telling me you are a lost cause. If you don't do it.

Desiree Petrich (24:10.2)
Yeah. And as the leader, is literally your responsibility. The people part of management is your responsibility to take the time. That is what your job is, even if it's not directly written in the description.

Katie Armentrout (24:24.555)
Yeah. And what you should do, like using that example is now go back to, Hey, what is our training standard? So the person who was coaching me on the team and getting me up to speed, what is that? So it does go back to, was there a process? Was this not in like the onboarding documents? Okay. That was a miss. Let's put it in there. So it doesn't happen over and over again, but that's how you treat those paper cuts. So it, doesn't, you know, get out of control later.

Desiree Petrich (24:52.824)
Yeah. No, I love that entire conversation and I think talking about it more will just fire both of us up. But from both sides, you know, from all angles, there is definitely better ways to go about it, especially holding people accountable. I'm just going to I mean, Katie and I are both working genius. Katie, are you a disc facilitator? Yeah. So, you know, a little bit biased on our end with the personality and productivity assessments, but they truly

Katie Armentrout (24:59.329)
I know.

Katie Armentrout (25:11.907)
no, not officially. I know a lot about it, but.

Desiree Petrich (25:21.984)
Even like Katie said, just to give you a frame of reference and common language around it, it's going to do so much for your ability to have hard conversations and say, hey, I know that this is going to be hard for me or it's going to be hard for you because of this. But, you know, and then put the end goal in sight and it's going to make things a lot less awkward because you're not essentially getting after the individual. You're getting after the process or the miscommunication or whatever it is that happened that caused the problem in the first place.

Katie Armentrout (25:51.041)
Yeah, yeah, you elevate the conflict to a process or an issue and not with the person itself.

Desiree Petrich (25:58.296)
Exactly. Yeah. Okay. So I just want to flip the script really quick because we talked about practice, right? You have to practice permit and promote, but the practice piece of it, we have to lead by example. We have to do the thing. What does that look like to you? How are you helping people put practice into practice?

Katie Armentrout (26:19.181)
I love that. Great question. How do people practice practice? It's usually it starts with it starts with a framework and an honest conversation. I say that all the time. So, you know, when I was coaching the leader, was like, so show me like where like I have them walk me through the process of, okay, what like with the hiring is a great example of like, what's your biggest pain point with accountability?

And they're like, well, we have a lot of turnover because people aren't doing their job. And I was like, wow, within less than a month they're being fired or they're quitting. So let's go into like, what's the root cause of it. And because it was new hires, like two to four weeks, then we looked into the hiring process. so came up with tactics of like, Hey, this is how you can start addressing it on the hiring process. And, you know, put some of those systems in place.

So yeah, it's really just going back through like trying to figure out what is the root cause and how can we like systematically fix this so that you don't have to, I mean, you still have to set your boundaries and uphold them. But if you put some systems in place for accountability, then you're not having to have all of the, like you can address it once. And then, and if you address it in the right way and you address that root cause the first time, then you're going to have less and less.

you know, issues coming up. It'll never be zero. But when you can address that root cause upfront, then it prevents things from happening or cuts down on it a lot. that's the first thing is like, is there like a systematic fix for it? And other things that we talked hiring process, other things are just again, writing out the expectation. Dan Martell, if he wrote, back your time and talks about the camcorder method.

Desiree Petrich (28:13.111)
Mm-hmm.

Katie Armentrout (28:15.359)
of just make video, like training videos for people. So you're to help onboard them. So there's a lot of different ways that you can get creative and set the expectation where it doesn't involve a lot of time. And when you do that and like the time, if you'd spend the 10 minutes to create or five minutes to create a loom video or a zoom video for someone and you're addressing it and the person watched it and they can watch it a hundred times, then again, that's preventing those situations from coming up and you.

as a leader having to address it.

Desiree Petrich (28:47.074)
Yeah. So it's not always about putting blame on others. It's about making sure that you've done what you need to to put the practices into place in the first place.

Katie Armentrout (28:56.354)
Yeah, make sure that, yeah, the first thing it's just, you have to have the systems in place. So, and that'll help you as a leader and your team to create consistency of, here's the expectation. Like we're all trained in doing this the right way, you know, or the same way. I shouldn't say the right way, but the same way. The other thing is also to, so again, put the systems in place to reduce the amount of, you know, times when people aren't meeting expectations.

The other thing is also to look at when somebody delivers work that again, you're like, I didn't expect that. It's also important to understand, like, is it wrong? I'm using air quotes for those listening. Is it wrong or is it just different? Like, will it still work? And so some of us are control freaks and like OCD about things.

And you also, I'll throw my husband, well, I'm not throwing him under the bus, but he always says, you can tell me what to do or how to do it, but you cannot tell me both.

Desiree Petrich (30:00.144)
Interesting.

Katie Armentrout (30:01.197)
And so this is another Dan Martell thing. He talks about transactional leadership versus transformational leadership. Transactional leadership as I'm telling you, do A, B, C, D, F, G. Transformational leadership as I'm saying, here's the outcome I expect. Like it could be grow my social media following to 10,000. I don't care how you do it. You're the expert. You're empowered to do your job, but this is the outcome. And I'm not telling you do X, Y, Z.

So I think we naturally start in transaction mode and not everybody, like it, you know, it starts with the self assessment. Are you more transactional and telling people what to do and getting in the weeds, which is taking up your time and where can you switch to that kind of outcomes based leadership and just be hands off and truly empower them? Because when you can empower people, that's where they thrive. And you're

you're enabling their creativity and trusting their expertise to do their job. Because if you as a leader are just constantly tell, tell, tell and instructing people to do things, you're not really leading them. You're just managing their tasks. And that's boring. So that's another way to like practice it is really look at, okay, am I giving them a checklist? And is it necessary or where can I switch to giving as few like

giving an outcome and a few boundaries, but giving them more freedom to do what they need to do.

Desiree Petrich (31:33.774)
Yeah, I think that's a perfect note to end on. And if you liked this episode, if you liked kind of the conversational tone of Katie and I and the passion that there is in it, we have another podcast episode that we did a while back that I'm going to link to in the show notes as well, because that conversation was just as great. It's actually one of the first times I ever heard about Working Genius, and now I'm certified in it. So if it tells you anything about how good the conversation was and how impactful it was.

That's my plug for it. But Katie, thank you so much for coming on. Accountability is a huge topic of conversation. It's one that I deal with every day with teams and I know that you do too. And I'm going to do an episode a little bit later talking about accountability for ourselves and the habits that we hold for ourselves, because if we are holding ourselves accountable, we're going to feel that much more confident and empowered to be able to set those boundaries for others. So stay tuned for that. But until next time, thank you so much, Katie, for joining me.

Katie Armentrout (32:29.781)
Yeah, thank you.