Insights
by Meredith Jones
As someone who has spent more than twenty years in HR, when I tell you I’ve seen careers unravel in every way imaginable—embezzlement, office affairs—you can believe it. But the pattern that stands out the most isn’t always the most dramatic:
It’s the blame game.
You’ve heard it before:
“Traffic made me late.”
“No one told me what to do.”
“I didn’t get the email.”
Blame culture isn’t juicy enough to make headlines, but it’s the biggest reason for careers stalling and culture dying. I’ve watched talented people sabotage their own growth by shifting responsibility elsewhere, waiting for someone else to make the change, or assuming circumstances are out of their control. Sometimes these statements are true—you can’t always control traffic. But when the conversation at work is more about why something can’t happen than about how it can…
You’re right!
Blame has a way of seeping into an organization. It changes how people view their work, their colleagues, and even themselves. Over time, it erodes trust and makes forward motion harder than it has to be.
People often slip into blame because it feels safer. Owning mistakes can be uncomfortable, even scary. We think if we can put blame elsewhere, we avoid looking bad, keep tough truths at arm’s length, and convince ourselves—falsely—that we have no real options.
But of course, it’s not true, and it doesn’t solve the problem. Blame feels like armor, but it’s paper-thin. The person shifting responsibility thinks they’re protecting themselves from judgment or consequence, but everyone else can often see it for what it is. Instead of preserving your image, it erodes it.
Simply put, blame rewires a team’s culture DNA:
Ownership creates the opposite effect: When people are responsible for their part—whether early in their careers, leading a team, or shaping strategy at the top—they set conditions for growth. Instead of energy going into excuses or finger-pointing, it goes into action.
That’s how you change the conditions around you: teams become more solution-oriented, leaders build more trust, and organizations begin moving faster. By owning your career, you signal to everyone that progress is possible.
Executives often assume their teams understand accountability. But employees watch leaders more closely than they realize, and no matter how much expertise leaders hold, when CEOs don’t admit mistakes or fail to make decisions transparently, employees won’t do it either.
Leaders have the power to stop the blame game before it spreads. You can:
That’s how you make ownership the norm.
Enter the core philosophy behind my new book, My Career Is My Responsibility. This guide helps shift mindsets at every level of an organization—employee, manager, and C-suite—so growth can happen without excuses holding it back.
If you’re ready to change the narrative in your career or your company, I invite you to start here: https://a.co/d/8bnZYsm
Sera Business Advisors is a management consulting firm specializing in HR with a business-first approach. Sera fosters growth and strategic development through training programs, an extensive library of proprietary tools, and a deep understanding of business for emerging startups, middle market companies, and publicly traded companies. To learn more, visit seraadvisors.com.