Document Your Work: Why Communication & Accountability Matter in Leadership

Leadership is not only about doing the work. It is also about ensuring that the work is properly documented, communicated, and understood.

This is particularly important for people in leadership positions, public office, government agencies, businesses, organisations, and institutions. Anyone entrusted with responsibility over people, systems or resources should develop the discipline of documenting their work.

Document what you inherited.

Document the problems you encountered.

Document what you are trying to change.

Document what you have changed.

Document what is working.

Document what is not working.

Because one day, someone may ask a very simple question:

“So, what exactly did you do?”

And when that question comes, you shouldn't have to search for PowerPoint presentations from five years ago to prove your contribution.

Your work should already have a record.

A recent interview with the Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Professor Mojisola Christianah Adeyeye, illustrates why this matters.

The Question About Her Record

During the interview, a journalist from Channels Television acknowledged some of the successes recorded by NAFDAC before asking Professor Adeyeye a direct question about the continued calls for her resignation.

The journalist asked:

“Thank you very much for highlighting some of the successes by NAFDAC. However, despite all these successes recorded by NAFDAC, some persons are still calling for your resignation, Ma. Are you planning on stepping down anytime soon, or are you taking that pressure”

Her immediate reaction was laughter.

But what followed was more significant.

Rather than simply responding that people would always talk, Professor Adeyeye proceeded to explain what she said she met when she assumed office, the challenges she inherited, and the changes that took place under her leadership.

According to her:

When she took over in 2017, NAFDAC wasn’t just struggling; it was in a state of absolute system failure.

The agency was suffocating under a 3.2 billion Naira debt, alongside 1.6 billion Naira in unpaid taxes owed directly to the government. Internally, things were just as bad: 70 percent of their laboratory equipment was completely broken, not a single Director had an official NAFDAC-issued laptop to work with, and the ICT department was essentially put in a "deep freezer", completely forgotten and underfunded. Globally, their credibility was in the gutter, with NAFDAC sitting at a maturity rating of minus-one out of four.

To make matters worse, financial discipline was nonexistent. She said in 2017 alone, the agency had logged over 700 official trips. She immediately put a hard freeze on all non-essential travel, declaring that she was raised never to be a slave to a lender. And by sticking to that strict discipline, under her leadership, NAFDAC paid off 3.1 billion Naira of that debt by November 2018.

Once the financial bleeding stopped, she turned her focus to institutional reform. She revived the ICT department, equipped the leadership with modern tools, restored the laboratories, and spent her first few years deliberately repairing NAFDAC's damaged image on the global stage.

The payoff for that steady, documented work was massive:

By March 2022, NAFDAC rose from a minus-one to a Maturity Level 3 agency, making it only the third regulatory body in Africa to hit that benchmark.

They were invited into the prestigious International Medical Devices Regulatory Forum.

And by 2025, NAFDAC became the 24th full member of the International Council for Harmonisation, standing proudly alongside top global regulators out of 194 agencies worldwide.

Whether one agrees with every claim made by a public official is a separate matter. The larger lesson here is not that a leader's account should automatically be accepted simply because the leader made it.

The lesson is this:

If you have done the work, build a record of the work.

Your Work Needs a Record

Imagine spending five years transforming an organisation.

You fix broken systems.

You reduce waste.

You introduce new processes.

You build a stronger team.

You clear debts.

You improve institutional efficiency.

You change organisational culture.

You restore confidence in an institution.

Then, years later, someone arrives and says:

“Nothing was working before me.”

What happens to your contribution?

If there is no proper documentation, your achievements can gradually disappear from institutional memory.

That is why documentation is not simply an administrative exercise. It is part of leadership.

A leader should be able to demonstrate:

This is what we inherited.

This is what we changed.

These are the numbers.

These are the milestones.

These are the reports.

These are the outcomes.

That is more powerful than simply saying, “I know what I did.”

Communication Is Part of Leadership

There is another important dimension to this: communication.

People do not have access to your office.

They do not attend every meeting you hold.

They do not see your spreadsheets.

They do not know every decision you make.

They may not know what you inherited.

They may not know what you are trying to fix.

They may not know what you are sacrificing to achieve the results you are pursuing.

That is why leaders have to communicate.

Public servants need to communicate with the people they serve.

Business leaders need to communicate with stakeholders.

Organisational leaders need to communicate with their teams.

And communication does not have to be complicated.

A video can do it.

An interview can do it.

A podcast can do it.

A town hall can do it.

A LinkedIn post can do it.

An X thread can do it.

A monthly report can do it.

A newsletter can do it.

The important thing is consistency and substance.

Do not wait until your record is being questioned before you begin explaining your record.

Start from day one.

Document From Day One

Take photographs.

Take videos.

Keep reports.

Keep data.

Record milestones.

Record challenges.

Record decisions.

Record failures.

Record successes.

Record the transformation.

Because memory is a terrible filing system.

People forget.

Institutions forget.

Governments change.

Management changes.

People leave.

People retire.

And, sometimes, history gets rewritten.

Documentation provides context.

It creates institutional memory.

It preserves evidence.

And it gives future leaders, employees, stakeholders and members of the public an opportunity to understand how an organisation moved from one point to another.

Leaders Should Not Become Invisible

If you are a Director-General, Permanent Secretary, Commissioner, Local Government Chairman, head of a government agency, university administrator or CEO, you do not have to become a social media celebrity.

You do not need to post every morning.

You do not need to be on every platform.

You certainly do not need to turn leadership into entertainment.

But people should know that you are working.

They should understand your priorities.

They should know what you have accomplished.

Most importantly, they should understand why you are doing what you are doing.

Leadership without communication creates a vacuum.

And when there is a vacuum, someone else will fill it.

Sometimes, the person who fills that vacuum may not understand your work. Sometimes, they may not even like you.

Yet they will tell your story for you.

And they may tell it badly.

That is why leaders should tell their own stories.

Not through propaganda.

Not through exaggerated claims.

Not by manipulating figures.

Not by attacking everyone who raises criticism.

Simply tell the truth.

“This is what we met.”

“This is what we're doing.”

“This is where we are.”

“This is what remains.”

And sometimes:

“We got this wrong.”

There is strength in that kind of honesty.

People do not expect leaders to be perfect.

They expect them to be accountable.

Talk to the People

Leaders should also resist the temptation to become detached from ordinary people.

Do not spend four years in an office and suddenly appear when an election is approaching or when your tenure is coming to an end.

People should hear from you while the work is happening.

If you are fixing a hospital, show people.

If you are improving a regulatory agency, explain it.

If you are clearing a backlog, tell people.

If you are changing a process, explain why.

And if there is a problem you have not yet solved, tell people that too.

Sometimes, people are not necessarily angry because a problem remains unsolved.

They are angry because they do not know what is being done about it.

There is a difference.

Social Media Has Changed the Rules

Social media has fundamentally changed leadership communication.

In the past, a government official who wanted to reach a large audience would typically need television, radio or newspapers.

Today, a leader can pick up a phone and communicate directly with millions of people.

A two-minute video can be enough to say:

“This is what we met.”

“This is what we're working on.”

“This is what we've achieved this week.”

“This is the challenge we're facing.”

“This is what we're doing next.”

That is it.

You do not necessarily need a television station.

You do not need to wait for a journalist to invite you for an interview.

You can communicate directly with the people.

That power, however, must be used responsibly.

Document the Journey, Not Just the Victories

Perhaps the most important advice is this:

Do not document only your victories. Document the journey.

Five years from now, the most valuable piece of documentation may not be the photograph of you commissioning a new building.

It may be the video you recorded when you first arrived and explained:

“When we arrived here, this was the problem.”

That becomes institutional memory.

It becomes history.

It becomes evidence.

It becomes context.

One day, someone may watch that video and finally understand why certain decisions were made.

That is the real value of documentation.

Do Not Wait Until You Are Leaving

If you are in leadership, document your work.

If you are a public officer, document it.

If you are a CEO, document it.

If you are running a business, document it.

If you are building a project, document it.

If you are doing something meaningful with your life, document it.

Do not wait until you are leaving before you begin telling people what you did.

Do not wait until someone questions your competence.

Do not wait until someone else takes credit.

And, most importantly, do not assume that people know.

They don't.

Tell them.

Show them.

Explain it.

Keep the records.

Because leadership is not only about what happens behind closed doors. It is also about whether the people you serve understand what you are doing.

You cannot lead people effectively from a distance forever.

You have to come closer.

You have to communicate.

You have to listen.

And sometimes, you simply have to say:

“This is where we are. This is what I met. This is what we're doing. And this is where we're going.”

That is not noise.

That is communication.

That is accountability.

That is leadership.

And if you have done good work, do not be afraid to document it.

You are not bragging simply because you are telling the truth about your work.

Just make sure the work comes first.

Then tell the story.

Because if you do not document your work, someone else may eventually document your story for you.

And you may not like the version they tell.