I was with a client last week who shared that during an exit interview, the departing employee shared a generous list of things that were not working in the company. It begged the question from the owner, “Why didn’t you just tell me before?!”
Moving past the dismay that the issues were not raised sooner, we added “Bring it forward faster” to the leadership team’s L10 Issues List. We celebrated this lesson because strengthening the Issues Component in the EOS Model does two things:
- Encourages the culture that everyone has a voice and is empowered to get to the root of an issue for the greater good of the company, solve it and make it go away forever.
- Builds trust and reliability around the idea that whatever is added to the Issues List can be prioritized and addressed using the same Issues Solving Track each time: Identify, Discuss, Solve (IDS).
In a series of interviews from Dare to Lead, Brene Brown asked leaders “What’s getting in the way of building more daring cultures?” Of the ten behaviors and cultural issues that leaders identified as barriers to courage, there was one issue that leaders ranked as the greatest concern:
“Avoiding tough conversations, including giving honest, productive feedback.”
Weekly meetings and a commitment to conscious leadership can help shift the avoidance of tough conversations and encourage issues to be brought forward faster. In EOS, weekly meetings use a L10 Meeting agenda that guide and encourage mining for issues from the start. Over 90 minutes, a team will cover the following agenda, spending nearly 70% of the meeting on Issues!
| Section | Time Allotted |
| Segue | 5 minutes |
| Scorecard | 5 minutes |
| Rocks | 5 minutes |
| Customer and Employee Headlines | 5 minutes |
| To-Do’s | 5 minutes |
| Issues | 60 minutes |
| Conclude | 5 minutes |
The other sections offer a quick pulse on the business and encourage teams to “drop it down” to the Issues List if anything is amiss. This is IMPORTANT! If something is off track, SAY something! By following this format, the leadership team can actually devote their energy and unique abilities to solving the KEY issues that would best move the company forward. Mark O’Donnell, Visionary for EOS Worldwide describes how to run the meeting in more detail in his blog here.
A final thought when committing to Bring It Forward Faster. Imagine what is possible when we consider this invitation by Psychologist and Author, Dr Harriet Lerner:
“If we only listened with the same passion that we feel about being heard.”
As we mine for the root cause of issues and practice communicating with clarity and kindness instead of avoiding the tough conversations, we become more conscious leaders serving the greater good of the company. Allowing others to do the same means we must also pause and listen.
Trust the process and enjoy the journey!
YOUR PRIVACY CHOICES