Leadership is Lonely but Accept the Blame as It Arrives on Your Desk

I was the leader of a purchasing department that had just sent out bids for a major project worth millions of dollars.  We had decided on the supplier to accept and were going to contact them One of my buyers was to fax the acceptance to the winning supplier along with their entire bid package. The buyer made a mistake when faxing the acceptance and the acceptance and winning bid package went out to all the bidding suppliers (a group fax transmission).

I immediately called all the bidding suppliers and apologized for the mistake. I took the blame for the errant faxes myself and assured them that it would not happen again. I personally met with the supplier who won the bid and asked if they now had any concerns now that their competitors had seen their bid. Fortunately, nothing secret or revealing was in the bid. Leadership is lonely but accept the blame as it arrives on your desk