Taking 100 Percent Responsibility

Today I am sharing highlights from Lynn G. Robbins’ BYU Address, Taking 100 Percent Responsibility. 

He speaks about agency and how it can get twisted by Satan and illustrates a few ways we are tempted to shift out of taking responsibility for our own outcomes and happiness.

Introducing his topic, he says, “The Book of Mormon teaches us that we are agents to “act . . . and not to be acted upon” (2 Nephi 2:26)—or to be “free to act for [our]selves” (2 Nephi 10:23). This freedom of choice was not a gift of partial agency but of complete and total 100 percent agency. It was absolute in the sense that the One Perfect Parent never forces His children. He shows us the way and may even command us, but, “nevertheless, thou mayest choose for thyself, for it is given unto thee” (Moses 3:17).

Assuming responsibility and being accountable for our choices are agency’s complementary principles (see D&C 101:78). Responsibility is to recognize ourselves as being the cause for the effects or results of our choices—good or bad. On the negative side, it is to always own up to the consequences of poor choices.”

Elder Robbins then shares 2 strategies or tactics Satan uses that we can find CLEARLY in the Book of Mormon as introduced by Korihor- the Antichrist and Nehor. 

The Korihor Principle—Separating Agency from Responsibility

The Korihor Principle can looks like this: Every man seeks after their own Gods. People can make their own rules. If I’m smart enough to get ahead somehow, it doesn’t matter who is impacted along the way. If I can take it by being stronger or smarter, it belongs to me. If it benefits US, it doesn’t matter what the implications are. Everything goes. This is the self-deception we talked about from the Arbinger Institute books in Episode 4 of this podcast–We see others as objects or obstacles. We see our needs as more valid than others’ needs- the rights’ of others as lesser than our own- for example a mother’s right to an abortion being greater than a child’s right to life or a person’s right to enter a store with covid-19 as more valid than the rights of others who may be immunocompromised. This is choosing to see what we want to see and choosing to believe what we want to believe. In this view, no greater authority is authorized to rule and there is no common indisputable law. In the words of Elder Christofferson, (that obedience to God’s laws and ordinances is “bondage.”3

In the words of Elder Robbins, “When the world separates choice from accountability, it leads to anarchy and a war of wills or survival of the fittest… We read in the book of Alma “that every man conquered according to his strength; and whatsoever a man did was no crime” (Alma 30:17; emphasis added). With negative consequences removed, you now have agency unbridled, as if there were no day of reckoning.”

Does that sound fun? Everyone stomping on everyone else to get to the top? Kind of the opposite of Christ or being a Christian which is easy to remember when we call Korihor the anti-Christ. How much fun would it be to live in that kind of society? 

Elder Robbins goes on to discuss the second highly successful strategy- the Nehor Principle: 

The Nehor Principle—Denying Justice

“If Satan is not successful in fully separating agency from responsibility, one of his backup schemes is to dull or minimize feelings of ­responsibility—what we could call the Nehor principle, also found in the book of Alma: “That all mankind should be saved at the last day, and that they need not fear nor tremble . . . ; for the Lord had created all men, and had also redeemed all men; and, in the end, all men should have eternal life” (Alma 1:4).

What an attractive offer for those who seek happiness in wickedness! (He continues) The Nehor principle depends entirely on mercy and denies justice… Denying justice is a twin of avoiding responsibility. They are essentially the same thing. A common strategy of each Book of Mormon anti-Christ was to separate agency from responsibility. “Eat, drink, and be merry; nevertheless, fear God—he will justify in committing a little sin” (2 Nephi 28:8).”

Nehor is mentioned as a person so briefly in the Book of Mormon but he was the first to introduce priestcraft and that one man was responsible for SO MUCH destruction in the Book of Mormon. The Amalekites and Amulonites were after the Order of Nehor and if you remember a few of their stories you will quickly see how devastating these practices are!

Elder Robbins says, “Faith without works, mercy without justice, and agency without responsibility are all different verses of the same seductive and damning song. With each, the natural man rejects accountability in an attempt to sedate his conscience… The path parades a guilt-free journey to ­salvation but is, in reality, a cleverly disguised detour to destruction (see 3 Nephi 14:13).

Agency without responsibility is one of the foremost anti-Christ doctrines—very cunning in its nature and very destructive in its results.”

Our agency must include the acknowledgement of our responsibility. In Elder Christopherson’s BYU Address entitled Moral Agency, we read that this is why we no longer use the term free agency. It is not free of responsibility or consequence.(3) 

So let’s shift gears and get to the story he shares that demonstrates so well how easy it is to shift responsibility and how prolific the results of taking responsibility! 

100 Percent Responsibility in the Distribution Center

In 1983 a few partners and I started a new ­company that taught time-management seminars and created and sold day planners.

For corporate seminars, we sent our consultants to the client’s headquarters, where they taught at the corporate training facilities. Prior to the seminar, two employees in our distribution center would prepare and ship several boxes of training materials, such as the day planners, binders, and forms. Also included was a participant’s seminar guidebook of around a hundred pages with quotes, fill-in-the blanks, graphs, and illustrations.

The two distribution center employees would normally send the seminar shipment ten days before the seminar. At the time that the following incident occurred, we were teaching around 250 seminars each month. With so many seminar shipments, these two employees would often commit errors, such as not shipping sufficient quantities or omitting certain materials or not shipping on time. This became an irritating and often embarrassing frustration for the consultants.

When these problems occurred, the seminar division would file a complaint with me, as the distribution center was one of my responsibilities. When I spoke with these two employees about errors and system improvements, they never wanted to accept responsibility for the errors. They would blame others, saying things like, “It’s not our fault. The seminar division filled out the Seminar Supplies Request form incorrectly, and we sent the shipment exactly according to their specifications. It’s their fault. You can’t blame us!” Or they might say, “We shipped it on time, but the freight company delivered it late. You can’t blame us!” Another excuse was, “The binder subsidiary packaged the individual seminar kits with errors, and we shipped the kits as they were given to us. It’s their fault.” It seemed these two employees were never responsible for the errors, and so the errors continued.

Then something critical happened. The director of training for a large multinational corporation attended one of our seminars and was so thrilled with it that she invited us to teach a pilot seminar to its fifty or so top executives. On the day of the seminar, our consultant arrived and opened the boxes of materials and discovered that the seminar guidebooks were missing. Without the seminar guidebooks, how would the participants follow along and take notes? Their training director was panic-stricken. Our consultant did the best he could by making sure each participant was given a pad of paper on which to take notes throughout the day, and the seminar turned out reasonably well, even without the guidebooks.

Extremely embarrassed and angry, their training director called our seminar division and said, “You will never teach here again! How could you have made such an embarrassing and inexcusable error with our pilot seminar?”

An upset senior vice president of our seminar division called me and said, “This is the last straw. We are about to lose a million-dollar account because of the distribution center’s errors. We simply can’t tolerate any more errors!”

As one of the owners of the company, I couldn’t tolerate such errors either. At the same time, I did not want to see these two breadwinners fired. After pondering possible solutions, I decided to implement an incentive system to motivate these two men to be more careful. For each seminar shipped correctly, they would receive one additional dollar, or a possibility of an extra $250 each month—hopefully enough to focus their attention on quality. However, if they made one error, a one-dollar penalty wasn’t much of a loss. I therefore decided to also include two $100 bonuses for no errors. With the first error they not only lost one dollar but also the first $100 bonus. If they made a second error, they lost the second $100 bonus.

I also told these employees, “If there is an error, you will lose your bonus, regardless of where that error originates. You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment.”

“Well, that’s not fair,” they responded. “What happens if the seminar division fills out the Seminar Supplies Request form incorrectly and, not knowing, we send the shipment with ‘their’ errors?”

I said, “You will lose your bonus. You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment’s success.”

“That’s not fair! What happens if we send the shipment on time but the freight company delivers it late?”

“You will lose your bonus. You are 100 percent responsible.”

“That’s not fair! What happens if the binder division commits errors in prepackaging the individual seminar kits? You can’t blame us for their mistakes!”

“You will lose your bonus,” I once again responded. “You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment’s success. Do you understand?”

“That isn’t fair!!”

“Well, it may not seem fair, but that’s life. You will lose your bonus.”

What I did was eliminate the anti-­responsibility list as an option for them. They now understood that they could no longer blame others, make excuses, or justify errors—even when they were right and it was someone else’s fault!

What happened next was fascinating to observe. When they would receive an order from the seminar division, they would call the seminar division to review the form item by item. They took responsibility for correcting any errors committed by the seminar division. They began to read the freight company’s documents to make sure the correct delivery date was entered. They began to mark the cardboard shipping boxes “one of seven,” “two of seven,” etc., with each box’s contents written on the outside of the box. They began sending shipments three or four days ­earlier than they had in their previous routine. A few days before the seminar they would call the client company to verify receipt of the shipment and the contents. If they had somehow omitted any materials, they had three or four extra days now to send missing items by express shipment. Errors finally stopped happening, and the employees began to earn their bonuses month after month. It was a life-changing experience for them to learn firsthand the power, control, and reward of being 100 percent responsible.

What these two employees learned is that when they blamed someone else, they were surrendering control of the shipment’s success to ­others—such as the seminar division or the freight company. They learned that excuses keep you from taking control of your life. They learned that it is self-defeating to blame others, make excuses, or justify mistakes—even when you are right! The moment you do any of these self-defeating things, you lose control over the positive outcomes you are seeking in life.

 He follows this with another story about a wife given the impression from the Spirit after a disagreement with her husband of “Do you want to be right, or do you want to be married?” 

He says, “In the story, this sister learned that even if she may have been right and it was her husband’s fault, blaming him was counterproductive, causing her to lose control over positive outcomes. She also discovered that there is power and control in the expression “I’m sorry” when it is used with love unfeigned and empathy—not merely to excuse ourselves.”

Ok, the final thing I just HAVE to share from this address is a helpful insight from Elder Jeffrey R. Holland about granting forgiveness to others. He says,

“Please don’t ask if it is fair. . . . When it comes to our own sins, we don’t ask for justice. What we plead for is mercy—and that is what we must be willing to give.

Can we see the tragic irony of not granting to others what we need so badly ourselves?10”

So in summary, first from Elder Robbins and then from me, he says “In summary, being 100 percent responsible is accepting yourself as the person in control of your life. If others are at fault and need to change before further progress is made, then you are at their mercy and they are in control over the positive outcomes or desired results in your life.” 

In the therapy world, this is called having an internal locus of control. We believe that we are responsible for our own success, outcomes and consequences as opposed to attributing them to luck, fate, or other people. It is taking action along with just praying for the best. Don’t let Satan or your brain tell you otherwise. If you’d like to take a little quiz to see whether you are operating with an internal or external locus of control you can visit the mindtools link below. (4) 

You, my friend, are a mighty force for good in your own life and in the lives of those around you! Now go make things happen! 

1. Christofferson, T. D. (2021, March 15). Moral Agency - D. Todd Christofferson. BYU Speeches. Retrieved August 25, 2022, from https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/d-todd-christofferson/moral-agency/

2. Renlund, D. G. (2022, August 3). Trust God and Let Him Prevail. Churchofjesuschrist.Org. Retrieved August 23, 2022, from https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/liahona/2022/08/03_trust-god-and-let-him-prevail?lang=eng

3. Robbins, L. G. (2021, November 1). Be 100 Percent Responsible | Lynn G. Robbins. BYU Speeches. Retrieved August 23, 2022, from https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/lynn-g-robbins/be-100-percent-responsible/

4. Mind Tools. (2022, August 15). Locus of Control - Career Development from MindTools.com. Retrieved August 25, 2022, from https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newCDV_90.htm

Episode 4 of Help? With Ashley Jaggi: https://rss.com/podcasts/ashleyjaggi/530569/