Soft Skills for the Professional Services Industry

CHAPTER 1Self‐Responsibility

THE PRINCIPLE OF SELF‐RESPONSIBILITY is becoming increasingly important in a time when others are to blame. In both professional and personal life, there are situations where others are to blame for mistakes.

EXAMPLE

Auditors in particular are accustomed by profession to seeking and finding fault with others. After all, the central question in assessing an internal control system is, “What could go wrong and who controls what?” Even if there is no four‐eyes principle, but only machine controls, there are people who are responsible for the programming. There is usually a “culprit“ when something goes wrong with a client's internal control system (ICS). Chances are it's not the auditor and their staff. Since the company's accounting and ICS are the subject of the audit, it appears that it is always the “others“ who are to blame for errors. The client's employees are then held responsible. Nevertheless, unless the auditor and his staff recognize that a control system is ineffective, they quickly get lost in excuses. Who likes to admit failures to a client?

In every company, one person, or a few people are in charge. It should go without saying for business owners that they are responsible for every project outcome. The larger the company, the more likely it is that unsuccessful projects will end up being just a matter of saving one's neck. The partner of a company blames his managers, or even customers (?) for the failure without realizing ...