Blame the system first.

This is my culture ethos.

In business, stuff goes wrong. We all know this. And as a company scales, there’s more stuff to go wrong. So it will.

And when that inevitable something goes wrong, how do you respond?

Blaming the system first means that instead of immediately placing blame on a person, always look to find blame in the system first.

Was there a breakdown in our process? Our policies? Our tools? Our support structures?

If there’s a deficiency somewhere in our systems that can explain why things happened the way they did, let’s fix them.

And if we can’t find fault in the system, only then can we place the blame and disciplinary action on an individual.