I learned an important lesson about repair over spilled guinea pig shavings when my daughter was 8.

When my daughters were in elementary school we had two guinea pigs that were not your normal skittish, high strung guinea pigs. Zeus and Conware came to us highly socialized by the family who had them before us. (See photo of Zeus and Conware)

I said yes to the guinea pigs because I think kids and pets are magic. With their pets, kids love unconditionally, learn to read non-verbal cues and engage in the regular responsibilities of care taking.

This day in particular my 8 year old and I set about the caretaking task of cleaning the cage. It was a Saturday and this was one task in a long line of many before I would allow myself to unwind. Like many working parents, I was in a constant battle between being present for my kids and adulting. On this day I was losing the battle on all fronts.

As we went to roll up the newspaper on the bottom of the cage, my daughter lost hold of her side raining soiled shavings all over the floor. The dog immediately tried to eat the pez-like poops scattered amongst the shavings.

The simple task had now become messy, time consuming and the dog was grossing me out.

(Truth be told I was also a little grateful to the dog)

An exasperated sigh flew out of my mouth along with some expletives. I told my daughter to step aside and my dog to sit so I could deal with the mess. I rolled up what I could in the newspaper and then swept the remaining shavings up with my hands and finally ran the vacuum over the floor. I quickly put fresh newspaper and shavings in the cage.

I breathed in the scent of fresh shavings, felt a sense of calm come back to me and looked over at my daughter.

She was completely deflated. Her shoulders were hunched, her eyes downcast and her mouth in a frown. I could see she was close to tears. My heart hit the floor and I realized in my haste to fix the problem I made a grave mistake.

“I can see that you are sad. Can you tell me why you are feeling sad?”

“I wanted to help fix it,” she said.

I realized that she had witnessed my frustration with her mistake and was given no recourse to repair the harm she perceived she’d done leaving her stuck in her feelings of guilt. In my haste to get the chore done, I had robbed her of the opportunity to fix the problem and left her feeling like it was her fault. Had I involved her in cleaning up the mess she not only would have learned new skills, she would have had the experience of restoring the goodwill between us. This unfortunate episode could have ended in a feeling of triumph and connection. Instead she was left feeling inadequate and mad at me.

And so It goes with adults in organizations too.

,This article in the Harvard Business Review does a nice job of explaining why we blame and how we process blame.

Why we blame: We blame because we are programmed to assume things happen for a reason. “The amygdala (part of the brain that experiences emotion) usually concludes that bad things happen on purpose, and it comes to this conclusion lightning fast. So fast, in fact, that we don’t even notice we’re making an assumption; we just know that the person closest to the problem must have done it on purpose!”

How we experience blame: Our brains process blame the same way we process physical attack, putting us immediately into fight or flight where we are primed to respond but impaired in problem solving.

When a mistake happens at work, too often we focus on finding fault so we can dispense discipline instead of allowing opportunities for repair or learning. At work when we are quick to blame others the impacts can be toxic to the culture and this misapplied accountability can hold organizations in mediocrity.

1. It creates a culture where people refuse accountability, pass the buck and are defensive.

2. Learning opportunities that lead to improvement are missed.

3. It places emphasis on people instead of systems so improvements to systems are overlooked.

Here are some questions to ask yourself when mistakes happen:

• • Are there systems that played a role in the mistake?

• • Where did the systems break down?

• • What improvements can we make to prevent future mistakes?

Coaching your employees through the learning opportunities posed by mistakes creates an opportunity for repair and a rich learning experience. Here are some coaching questions to ask employees when mistakes happen:

• • What do you think happened?

• • Why do you think that happened?

• • What changes would help avoid repeating the mistake in the future?

• • What support do you need from me?

You will leave this conversation feeling connected with a path forward instead of frustrated.