Field Notes Inside an Integrated Communications Agency

Can you imagine the conversation in Toyota's board room over the past few days? "Boys, we have a big problem. Now, what are we going to do?" Can you imagine the review of the data, the potential causes, the options, the implications, the risk? Surely, there were different perspectives offering a point-of-view on what to do - perhaps a naysayer, a skeptic, a customer champion, a company loyalist, the risk analysts, the financial experts and undoubtedly the lawyers.

Can you imagine the guts it took to make the final decision? To say to shareholders, dealers, customers and the world "not only are we going to recall 2.3 million vehicles, we are going to suspend selling eight other models accounting for 57 percent of our business."

We all make mistakes. And, sometimes things go wrong without anyone making a mistake. I haven't met anyone who likes to admit their mistakes. (And, if you ask my husband, he'd say the same thing about me.) Perhaps one of the hardest things to do as a leader is take accountability for the actions of others. Coaches routinely do it. Witness Roy Williams' comments in the wake of the Carolina Tar Heels basketball team's collapse at the start of the 2009-10 ACC season. When a leader takes responsibility it can take some of the pressure off the team. That applies to business as well as sports. Leaders build their teams. They are accountable for systems, process and oversight. Leaders take the compliments when their team succeed and they have to take responsibility for shortcomings.

It's one thing for a leader to admit a mistake, it's another to be accountable. Accountability doesn't mean ferreting out who's to blame, although sometimes that's a necessary part of making sure the problem doesn't happen again. Accountability means making it right. That's what Toyota is doing and that's what business has to do. Research, such as the Edelman Trust Barometer, shows consumers trust in business is down. Taking responsibility and then being accountable to customers is a necessary step in regaining consumer trust.

Customer confidence and trust is a tremendous asset to a business. Businesses invest a lot of resources in having the right products, services and talent to earn the confidence of their customers. Even with stellar products and people, problems will happen. And when they do, how the business responds to the challenge will determine whether customers will continue to trust the brand.

Many will speculate on whether Toyota is making the right call. The accelerator problem may be so widespread that the damage to their business and their brand is irreparable. But if you were in the Toyota board room faced with data showing a problem that was potentially risking millions of lives and you had a brand built on reliability, there was only one call to make.