I was working with a service manager a while back who was frustrated. His install techs weren’t following the process. Job photos weren’t getting taken. Steps were getting skipped. And every time he tried to address it, he felt like a nag.
Sound familiar?
He asked me what so many managers in the trades ask: “How do I hold people accountable without it turning into me chasing everyone around all day?”
Here’s the question I asked him back.
“Who created the install process your team is supposed to follow?”
He thought about it for a second. “Well… I did. Or it came down from ownership.”
“Right,” I said. “So it’s your standard. Not theirs.”
There’s a difference. And that difference matters more than most managers realize.
When a standard is handed down from above, people comply with it when someone’s watching and let it slide when no one is. It’s not their standard. They had no say in it, no stake in it, and no real ownership of it.
So here’s what I had him do instead.
He sat down with his install team and asked them a simple question: “What does a good install look like? Walk me through the process, start to finish.”
He just listened and wrote it all down.
Then he asked another question: “If we have an install that doesn’t meet what you just described, I’m going to call it out. You good with that?”
They said yes. He wrote their answers on a flip chart, and every person in that room initialled it.
Now when he brings it up, he’s not the one enforcing his standard. He’s holding them to their own word.
That is a completely different conversation.
Here’s what I want you to think about in your own business. You’ve got standards that aren’t being upheld right now. Maybe it’s job photos. Maybe it’s uniforms slipping. Maybe it’s company vehicles that look like a disaster on wheels. Maybe it’s a check-in process nobody follows.
Whatever it is, ask yourself: did your team have any say in building that standard? Did they agree to be held to it?
If the answer is no, you don’t have an accountability problem. You have a buy-in problem.
The fix isn’t a tougher policy or a stern meeting. The fix is a conversation where you bring your team in, ask what good looks like in their words, document it, and get their agreement.
Clear is kind. And when the standard belongs to them, holding them to it stops feeling like nagging and starts feeling like keeping a promise they made to each other.
That’s the kind of accountability that actually sticks.
If this is something your team is working through, I’d love to talk. Accountability conversations are a big part of the leadership work we do at Velocity Leader, both in our one-day workshops and our longer development programs. Reach out and let’s figure out what makes sense for your team.
