An accountability partner is a kick-ass partner. It’s the person who’s going to tell you the truth even when it hurts. It’s the person who’s going to be there when nobody else is. It’s the person who’s going to hold your hand and, for lack of a better phrase, kick your ass when you need it.
Finding such a person is a challenge. It can be difficult to enter into a relationship where truth is required – both truth with the other person and truth with oneself. It’s a risk to entrust one’s hopes and fears to another person. It’s hard to admit you have blind spots in the mirror you use to examine yourself.
Once those risks have been taken, you can’t turn back. You are in a relationship in which you are accountable to another person and that person or perhaps a different person is accountable to you. You can’t take your responsibility lightly; you are part of an authoritative community, and it is your duty to speak the truth as well as grace.
Accountability partners come in all shapes and sizes and venues. Some accountability partners may be found in a writing group. Others may be found living next door or across the street. Another might be a person you meet at the gym twice a week.
Anybody and everybody can be an accountability partner. You can and are the kick-ass partner somebody needs. Will you be that partner? Will you seek your own accountability partner for whatever project or habit it is that you’re trying to bring to fruition?
Very provocative post, Erin! An honest broker is essential to refining your work, but it takes a strong ego to accept their feedback. A lot of people couldn’t handle either giving or receiving the feedback!
@leaderswest Exactly. I have several people who act as accountability partners with the different things I do, including some of my readers. It requires a certain amount of grace to be able to give or to receive criticism.
I know that I see my role as a coach as being one of accountability; my aim is to keep people accountable to the goals they’re setting, whether that be starting and maintaining a business blog, improving their written communications, or putting a book together. I think it helps that I’ve been on the receiving end of that criticism many times. It helps me to relate to my clients and to try to offer the criticism in the most gracious way possible. Of course, some people need the “don’t-hold-anything-back” sort of criticism, and I try to be in tune with that.