Running a business isn’t easy. If you’re like most business leaders, you’ve got a lot you want to accomplish. In a recent client session, the team had an a-ha moment while we were setting priorities for the next 90 days. They were frustrated because they felt like there was never enough time in the day to get stuff done. Even though they had clear priorities for the 90-day period, things just kept coming up throughout the quarter that they felt obligated to tackle right then. This put them over their time capacity. The Time Capacity Ball Imagine a ball that represents your time capacity – you have a limit to the amount of time you can work in a day – after all, there are only 24 hours in any given day (if you’ve figured out how to fit more hours into a day, please tell me!!). You’ve got to then choose

Are you frustrated that everything isn’t getting done from one meeting to the next? You’re not alone! Many of my client leadership teams have expressed similar frustrations over the last year. Frustrations were cropping up in two main areas that had a low completion percentage: Rocks – the priorities that people committed to over the last 90 days To Dos – 7-day action items that come out of weekly meetings Teams were only seeing completion rates of 40-50% of their To Dos, but they drastically increased their weekly completion percentage to 90%+ consistently. Want to see your team’s completion rate skyrocket like that? Here are 7 steps to getting all of your team’s To Dos done every week. 1) Prioritize Your Issues First Some of my clients’ teams had lengthy issues lists, and they got into the habit of tackling the issues from top to bottom. But because of the

A five-person leadership team at a successful 50-year-old company recently got stuck and hit the ceiling. Two years ago they started to implement the EOS Tools on their own, but they were still dealing with several frustrations.   Too many meetings. They had meeting after meeting after meeting, and they didn’t have enough time to get anything done! Revisiting the same issues over and over again. They thought they’d solved their issues, but a few thorny ones lingered and never really went away. Too many miscommunications. They were working against themselves at times with miscommunication, causing lots of extra work. Accountability lacking. Roles and responsibilities weren’t as clear as they wanted them to be. Financial results were always behind. They always seemed to fall short of the goals they’d set and they couldn’t figure out why. One Root Issue Can Sprout Several Business Problems The breakthrough came after setting their company rocks (3-7 priorities for

Do you want any of these for your business in the coming year? Peace of mind. Consistency. Efficiency. Scalability. More Fun. And of course, more profit. Every leadership team that I’ve worked with seems to have an instant eagerness to improve upon these areas in their business, regardless of industry. The key to achieving these goals in the new year is a three-step exercise of identifying, documenting, and following your company’s Core Processes. It’s not a sexy solution, but it’s incredibly powerful. And it’s not as painful as you might think. As Jim Collins said, “Magic occurs when you combine a spirit of entrepreneurialism with a culture of discipline.” So keep an open mind and let’s see what kind of magic is in store for your company in 2017. I’ll walk you through the three steps. 1) Identify Your Company’s Core Processes Your Core Processes are your WAY of doing business. Every organization has a handful

Annual planning season is upon us. This is the time of year that many of my clients have their two-day offsite annual planning sessions. It’s their opportunity to reflect on last year’s successes and misses, as well as getting clear on where to focus their time, energy, and resources over the coming year. In a recent annual planning session with a financial services company, the six-person leadership team had an a-ha moment. They are all very polite, friendly people who are hard workers, but they didn’t fully trust each other. They trusted each other to do their jobs and get stuff done, but they didn’t have a vulnerability-based trust. What does this mean? The secret ingredient to a successful company is vulnerability-based trust. Why Your Company Needs Vulnerability-Based Trust Patrick Lencioni does an amazing job teaching the topic of team health and vulnerability-based trust in his book The Five Dysfuctions of