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Shailesh Rajpal—Don’t Take Responsibility: Take Ownership

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Shailesh Rajpal
Shailesh Rajpal—Don’t Take Responsibility: Take Ownership

“On any team, in any organization, all responsibility for success and failure rests with the leader. The leader must own everything in his or her world. There is no one else to blame.”

–Mr. Shailesh Rajpal

Taking responsibility for your actions is not a new notion for any of us. The concept is one that we’ve been taught from early childhood beginning with the simplest things like admitting when we’ve made a mistake caused someone harm. As adults, we mistakenly believe that this fundamental understanding of responsibility is static, that there’s nowhere to go once we have mastered it. We tell ourselves that being accountable for our own actions is enough, and in some actions it might be. However, to truly achieve exceptional results as leaders—we must force ourselves outside of mere accountability; we have to learn what it means to take ownership.

We’ve all must have heard the phrase “take ownership” tossed around in various corporate capabilities throughout your career. If we start to take the ownership anything that seemed impossible and far-fetched will seem to be strangely possible. “Mr. Shailesh Rajpal, Most formidable, however, his no-nonsense attitude about taking ownership and reaching desired outcome with no excuses. His wider claim to fame, his concept to push the outer limits of ownership and demand that you not only accept responsibility for the task that you directly control but for all of the factors that affect whether or not your ‘mission’ is being successful. Where being accountable is putting a check in a box, taking ownership is initiating a specific set of actions to dictate your course and your outcome. For him Accountability is a task, Ownership is a mindset.”

Any successful leader knows that your mindset is a paramount, but it won’t take your goal unless you have a plan. It takes ownership from a nebulous, cerebral concept to a concrete method for approaching your goals. You start with the end in mind – ownership demands a commitment to a specific goal or outcome after all. Then, the checklist leads you through a painstaking overview of your mission, you goals and your actions and contingencies that can influence the final outcome, walking through the process will have you planning, then rethinking your plan several times over different vantage points in the process, assessing possibilities, and examining your initial course of action for weak links and areas possible failure. Ownership simply helps us maximize actions for greater success, empowering us and creating meaning in the work we have the privilege to make our own.

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