Take the credit, hand out the blame
You take credit for other people’s work and blame teammates or bad luck when things fail—paying the price later in broken trust and people refusing to back you up.
Share when secure; hide mistakes when scrutinized
When you feel secure or a win is big enough for everyone, you share credit; when you feel insecure or scrutinized, you overstate your role and hide mistakes until caught, carrying quiet guilt afterward.
Own mistakes when asked, on calm weeks
During calm weeks, you own your mistakes when asked and point out others’ contributions. When a high-stakes project goes sideways, willpower slips and you subtly angle to protect your own reputation first.
Note credit as it happens; flag misses first
You build credit and accountability into your workflow—noting people’s contributions as they happen and flagging your own misses before anyone asks. Even under executive scrutiny, you publicly credit others by name and own your errors cleanly.
A heat shield for the group; praise goes to others
You deliberately put yourself on the hook for high-risk calls, acting as a heat shield for your group during a failure while making sure praise lands on the people who did the work. After a miss, you dissect your own setup first in front of the room and upgrade the process so the same failure mode can’t repeat.