What does suffering have to do with accountability, if everything important keeps working, no laws are broken, and the org meets its metrics?
If they leave and things blow up, then that impacts things no? Accountability is about ensuring someone gets held to account for the results of their actions.
Accountability doesn’t mean ‘they pay because I’m unhappy’. It means ‘if they break the law, they get punished’. Or ‘if they break the org or don’t deliver results their bosses want they get fired.’.
Being a dick of a boss isn’t illegal. Burning people out (when they do it voluntarily) isn’t illegal. Things they may be doing that cause that tend to be purely subjective and individual, and many people will disagree it’s even happening!
Punishing them for those may be vengeance, or revenge, lashing out, or whatever.
And since no one can make someone happy (or unhappy), and there isn’t even an objective measure of it, society generally doesn’t care about that legally. What would accountability mean in those cases then?
Going to jail because people don’t like you as a boss?
Making a hostile work environment is already against the law and actionable, if it can be proven. It’s a reasonably high bar though, and most environments people are pissed about around here likely don’t meet it.
It’s up to everyone individually to make those decisions and tradeoffs. They’re accountable for the results of continuing to work somewhere, or not, for instance.
It’s a two way street. In the sense of;
“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal their bread.” ― Anatole France
It may not be great, but other alternatives are so prone to abuse and shittiness that I personally haven’t seen many better alternatives.