What is Accountability? Meaning and Definition

Meaning of Accountability: The fact or condition of being accountable; responsibility. Accountability in Financial Management; The concept of accountability can be defined as the process through which a person is held answerable for his actions and deeds. “Accountability breeds responsibility” – This is a famous quote by Dr. Stephen R. Covey gives the meaning of accountability in rather general terms. Corporate accountability involves being answerable to all an organization’s stakeholders for all actions and results. “The obligation of an individual or organization to account for its activities, accept responsibility for them, and to disclose the results in a transparent manner. It also includes the responsibility for money or other entrusted property.” So, what is the question we discuss; What is Accountability? Meaning and Definition.

The Concept of Financial Management explain What is Accountability? with Meaning and Definition.

By Wikipedia; In ethics and governance, accountability is answerability, blameworthiness, liability, and the expectation of account-giving. In leadership roles, accountability is the acknowledgment and assumption of responsibility for actions, products, decisions, and policies including the administration, governance, and implementation within the scope of the role or employment position and encompassing the obligation to report, explain and be answerable for resulting consequences.

Accountability from the organizational perspective bears great importance as it is the measure through which the performance of the organization and a person serving can be judged and analyzed. Accountability has different forms. First, the individualizing form of accountability can be studied in which the accountability contributes to making the realization of the image an individual perceives about it. This perspective helps a person to polish his senses and action thereby improving his image that is noticed by others.

The second view of accountability is the socializing form in which a person can improve its performance and efficiency by interacting with some of the experienced people in the organization. Accountability institutionalizes the use of accounting through which it operates in the organizations and firms.

Accountability is an assurance that an individual or an organization will be evaluated on their performance or behavior related to something for which they are responsible. Corporate accountability involves being answerable to all an organization’s stakeholders for all actions and results. Accountability, on the other hand, means that the employee is held responsible for successfully completing the task and will have to at least explain why they failed to do so.