By definition, accountability means the state of being explainable or answerable.  Or even better, a willingness to be.  Talk of accountability is everywhere.  Newspapers, websites, consultants, executives ... heck, scroll through this blog and you’re bound to find the word pop-up all over.  Google “accountability” and hundreds of stories appear--Major League Baseball, the 2008 presidential campaign, the recent GAO report on Iraq, Nebraska’s football team —always pointing to holes where accountability is lacking.  In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to find a story about someone or something being praised for being accountable.  The nonprofit world included.

So why is it that we tend to associate accountability with negativity?  

Maybe its because we tend to think transparency equals accountability.  If they show it, it will come.  Organizations displays financial records—showing flaws in how they distribute funds to programs, discrepancies in accounting, or that large sums of money was spent on a program that failed.  We are left asking questions.  Why?  Because we want more, we need more.  Instead, we are left disappointed.  We don’t want a show, we want a dialogue.  The willingness is there, but the answers are not.

What makes an organization accountable is their ability to see beyond simply realizing such flaws exist and doing something to counter them.   It’s their willingness to step up and provide the answers, the explanations, the promise for change, and to turn around.  The road long, tough, and often very bleak.  Some argue that while governments have elections and corporations have boards, nonprofits lack the “who” to be accountable to.  Yet, their “who” is bigger than a process, bigger than a board.  Their “who” is the people, the reason, the cause for which they exist.  When it comes to accountability, it’s not the “who” nonprofits need to figure out.

Maybe we associate accountability with negativity because that it is all we see.  Or even worse, all we know.  Maybe we need to go beyond the definition of accountability to demand more and ask the really important question—how?