One lesson I carried from the Army into business was fairly simple: if you accept responsibility, you own the outcome.

I learned that long before I had an executive title.

As a young soldier, and later as an NCO, responsibility wasn’t an abstract management concept.

Other people were counting on you to do your part.

Later, in business, the surroundings changed considerably.

Customers.

Employees.

Suppliers.

Budgets.

Projects.

Executive meetings.

But I never found the basic principle changed very much.

If someone trusted me with a client, I had a responsibility to take care of that client.

If a supplier raised a legitimate problem, I had a responsibility to deal with it.

If a customer left because of something within my organization, I couldn’t simply assign the problem downward and consider my part finished.

Titles may determine authority.

They don’t eliminate responsibility.

That idea has influenced the way I’ve approached business relationships for most of my working life.