You can build a great culture by making sure every single team member has a written job description (we like to include expected weekly work hours and their pay in the document too). This is a major first step.

I can’t tell you how many times we have pulled up the job description of a struggling team member to review what we all agreed to when they joined our team. Staying on this page with your team will solve a lot of headaches for you as the leader.

2. Keep tabs on transparency and truth

Second, build a great culture that is steeped in transparency and truth. How do you do this? My partner and I put recurring blocks on our calendar to meet privately with each team member every quarter.

This is where we ask questions like:

• Where are you struggling, and what do you think is the reason?

• Where do you feel successful, and tell us how you did that?

• Are you managing your calendar well? (We’ll pull up the calendar many times to look at it together.)

• What are we assuming you know about the growth of the firm that we can clarify?

• What does your work production look like in the 40 hours you’ve committed to the firm in your full time role?

In these meetings, we may share our own confidential struggles, with the idea that we want to encourage our team to reciprocate by sharing where they are struggling, or where they are experiencing wins.

Our private meetings are meant to open up the sharing by promoting a transparent culture. Transparent cultures promote adherence to roles in unbelievable ways.

Transparent cultures lead to trust.

And when groups of people trust one another, then they are open to the leadership that is necessary to both encourage their growth and address areas that need correction.

Recommended reading: Karbon’s values in action (part 1): Connectivity and openness

3. Turn up the heat on accountability

Finally, expect adherence to job descriptions. When a team member struggles, you gradually come closer and closer. It’s as if you are ‘tightening the screws down’ on a team member who is struggling.

Let me explain.

When team members struggle, the first thing you do is assume you were unclear about their role. So you have a meeting with the employee after they have dropped the responsibility of their role multiple times. This is where you make sure they understand what you expected when you hired them (this is the basis of them accepting responsibility).

If they continue to struggle, you continue to meet with them, turning up the heat more and more each time you meet, telling them you expect them to take on the responsibility of the job they agreed to when they started at your firm. You’re simply calling them to the responsibility they agreed to when you hired them (see the first step).

Side note: ‘Turning up the heat’ is not micromanaging, as many struggling team members like to describe it. Here is my definition of micromanaging: ‘harassing a team member to do their job in arbitrary, specific ways that assuage the control tendencies of the leader when the job performance of the team member is actually appropriate.’ In other words, micromanaging is not necessary for teams that are doing their job in the first place.

When teams see their leaders creating a serious culture of accountability, then they tend to follow suit. On the contrary, as you come closer and closer to struggling teams that continue to struggle, they typically feel such a level of heat that leads them to eventually leave the organization, or you have such a backlog of uncomfortable warnings and documentation that you can legitimately fire them.

Expect accountability from day one

Firm owners should expect teams to be accountable to their work and the entire team, and feel the responsibility to produce their work consistently.

Team members who don’t feel responsible for their collaboration with the team require consistent care, where you need to ask them to step up their work. Either they step up, or they must be let go eventually.

You can not allow a rogue team member to continue doing whatever they want. It’s unkind and hurtful to your other employees And by keeping them accountable, even if that results in termination, you’re setting a strong example for the rest of your team.

Ultimately, you’re saying that you walk the walk. If not, you are promoting your firm as slack, and willing to put up with unaccountable team members and client work that is not up to scratch.