You’ve probably seen the standard corporate org chart. It’s that rigid, top-down pyramid where everyone is obsessed with who reports to whom. It’s basically a map of egos. When Gino Wickman introduced the Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS), he took that traditional model and flipped it on its head. He called it an Accountability Chart.
It sounds like a subtle name change. It isn't.
Most people looking for eos accountability chart examples are trying to fix a specific kind of chaos. You know the vibe. Projects stall because "I thought Dave was doing that," or three different people are trying to make the same decision, and nobody actually has the final word. It’s frustrating. It’s also expensive.
An accountability chart doesn't care about titles. It cares about "seats."
The Core Concept: Function Over People
Traditional charts are built around people. You have "Susan," and because Susan is great at marketing but also happens to be good at math, you give her the marketing seat and the finance seat. Suddenly, your chart is a tangled mess based on one person's unique skill set.
That is a trap.
In the EOS world, you define the seat first. What does the business actually need to run? If you were to start from scratch today, what functions are essential? Usually, for a small to mid-sized business, it boils down to three big buckets: Sales/Marketing, Operations, and Finance/Admin.
Then you add the two specialized roles that make EOS unique: the Integrator and the Visionary.
The Visionary vs. Integrator Dynamic
Let's look at a real-world eos accountability chart example of a $10 million manufacturing company. The founder, let’s call him Rick, is a classic Visionary. He’s got 20 ideas before breakfast. Most of them are terrible, but two of them are billion-dollar ideas.
If Rick is also running the day-to-day operations, the company will eventually implode. Visionaries are usually "people-movers" and "big-picture thinkers," but they often lack the patience for the grit of daily management.
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The Integrator is the person who filters those ideas. They are the "how" to the Visionary’s "what."
In this manufacturing example:
- Visionary Seat: Big relationships, R&D, culture, and "the next big thing."
- Integrator Seat: P&L responsibility, removing obstacles, and making sure the leadership team is actually talking to each other.
If these two roles are confused, the whole company feels like it’s spinning its wheels. You’ve seen it. The boss says "Go left" on Tuesday, and then "Go right" on Thursday. An effective Accountability Chart stops that by giving the Integrator the power to say, "Rick, that’s a great idea for next year, but right now we are going left."
Breaking Down the "Major Functions"
Once you have the top two seats, you look at the rest of the leadership team. Honestly, this is where most companies get stuck. They try to have ten people on the leadership team.
That’s too many.
A healthy leadership team is usually between three and seven people. Here is a prose-based breakdown of what a standard eos accountability chart example looks like for a service-based agency:
Sales and Marketing Seat: This isn't just about "doing ads." It’s about the entire revenue engine. The primary accountabilities usually include lead generation, closing deals, and brand messaging. If the phone isn't ringing, we know exactly who to look at. It’s not a committee decision. It’s this seat.
Operations Seat: This is the "doing" of the work. For an agency, this might be account management and creative production. Their job is to make sure the client actually gets what the sales team promised.
Finance and Admin Seat: Often overlooked until something breaks. They handle the "LMA" (Leading, Managing, and Accountability) for the office staff, the cash flow, and the IT systems. They are the guardians of the company’s assets.
The "GWC" Filter: The Secret Sauce
You can’t talk about accountability charts without talking about GWC. It stands for Get it, Want it, and Capacity to do it. When you look at an example chart, you’ll see names in the boxes. But before a name goes in a box, the leadership team has to agree that the person fits.
"Get it" means they truly understand the soul of the role. It’s intuitive for them.
"Want it" means they actually want to do the work. You’d be surprised how many people are in leadership roles because they felt they had to take the promotion for the money, even though they hate managing people.
"Capacity" is about time and talent. Do they have the actual hours in the day and the mental bandwidth to excel here?
If a person is a "No" on any of these three, they are in the wrong seat. Period. It sounds harsh. It is. But it’s also the only way to scale a business without losing your mind.
Common Mistakes in Accountability Chart Examples
I’ve seen a lot of teams mess this up by being too "nice." They don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, so they create "Co-Heads of Marketing."
That is a disaster.
If two people are accountable, no one is accountable. You need one head. One person who owns the number. One person who stays up at night when that department is failing.
Another mistake? The "Hollow Seat." This happens when a company grows quickly. You have a box for "Operations Manager," but the CEO is still doing all the work. The seat exists on paper, but the accountability hasn't actually been transferred. This leads to massive bottlenecks where the CEO is the "single point of failure" for every tiny decision.
Real World Example: The Tech Startup
Imagine a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company. Their chart looks a bit different.
- Visionary: Founder focused on the future of AI and long-term fundraising.
- Integrator: COO running the weekly "Level 10" meetings and keeping the departments aligned.
- Product Seat: Responsible for the roadmap and the engineering team.
- Growth Seat: A hybrid of Sales and Marketing focused on user acquisition.
- Customer Success: Focused purely on retention and churn.
In this example, if the churn rate spikes, the Customer Success lead doesn't get to point fingers at the Product team. They own that metric. They might need to collaborate with Product to fix a bug, but the accountability for the "Why" sits squarely in their box.
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How to Start Building Your Own
Don't start with your current employees. That’s the biggest mistake.
Instead, get a blank piece of paper. Or a whiteboard. Imagine your company is at the next level of revenue—maybe double what you are doing now. What are the essential seats needed to get there?
Map those out first.
Define the 5 "Roles" or "Accountabilities" for each seat. These should be high-level. Think "Profitability," "Customer Satisfaction," or "Lead Conversion."
Once the seats are perfect, then—and only then—do you look at your people. Does "Jim" fit the "Operations" seat? Does he GWC it? If not, you have a "People Move" to make. This is the hardest part of EOS, but it’s also where the most growth happens.
The Concept of "Right People, Right Seats"
Jim Collins famously talked about getting the right people on the bus. EOS takes it a step further. You need the right people, in the right seats, headed in the right direction.
A "Right Person" is someone who shares your company's core values. They are a culture fit.
A "Right Seat" is someone who GWCs their specific accountability chart box.
If you have a "Right Person" in the "Wrong Seat," you try to move them. They are a great human; they just aren't a great fit for that specific job. But if you have a "Wrong Person" (doesn't share values) in a "Right Seat" (they are a high performer), they are a "terrorist" in your organization. They will eventually destroy your culture. You have to let them go.
Actionable Steps for Your Leadership Team
Stop using the term "Org Chart" today. It’s a small psychological shift that makes a massive difference.
Schedule a three-hour session with your leadership team. Your only goal is to define the "Major Functions" of the business. Don't talk about names yet. Just talk about the seats.
Once you have the seats, define the top 5 responsibilities for each. If a seat has 10 responsibilities, it’s probably two seats disguised as one. Split it.
Finally, do the GWC check for every person currently in a seat. Be honest. Be brutally honest. If someone doesn't "Want it," they will eventually burn out. If they don't have the "Capacity," they will fail.
Building an accountability chart isn't a "one and done" project. It’s a living document. As your company grows from 10 people to 50, and from 50 to 200, the chart will evolve. Seats will split. New functions will emerge.
The goal isn't perfection on the first draft. The goal is clarity. When everyone knows exactly what they are responsible for—and just as importantly, what they are not responsible for—the friction in the business disappears. You stop managing people and start managing the system.
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Identify your Visionary and Integrator first. Without those two roles defined, the rest of the chart is just a list of names. Once that "two-in-a-box" relationship is solid, the rest of the structure will find its level. Use these eos accountability chart examples as a starting point, but don't be afraid to customize them to the unique "DNA" of your specific business. Every company has a different rhythm; your chart should reflect yours.