There are ways to avoid creating a cover-up culture. Avoid playing the blame game. Concentrate on solving problems rather than jockeying for advantage from problems. Concentrate on solving the root cause of problems rather than getting rid of symptoms of problems.

It's very, very easy to go down the wrong route on this, it's important to build up a strong culture of honesty and engineering integrity and that starts with people in leadership positions (which may not be people in the highest management positions).