Now that our departmental Level 10 Meetings are running smoothly, our middle managers get stuck deciding which unresolved problems should stay in their department versus which issues must escalate to the leadership team. What is the exact protocol for escalating an issue from a departmental Level 10 to the executive Level 10?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Departmental Level 10 Meetings keep frontline teams aligned, but without clear boundaries, middle managers either hoard systemic problems or dump every minor tactical headache onto the executive team. To keep your executive Issues List clean, you must establish an explicit escalation threshold for departmental meetings.

A departmental issue should only be escalated to the executive Level 10 Meeting™ if it meets one of four criteria:
- It requires a cross-departmental solution that involves peers outside the department head's authority.
- It requires an unbudgeted financial expenditure or a change to core company policy.
- It directly threatens a company-wide Rock, a company Scorecard measurable, or a commitment in the V/TO®.
- The department has tackled the issue through IDS® across two consecutive meetings and failed to solve the root cause.

If an issue does not meet these criteria, it must stay in the department. The department head owns that seat on the Accountability Chart and is responsible for solving it locally.

When an issue is escalated, the department head must bring it to the executive meeting personally. They cannot simply paste a vague topic onto the executive board. They must define the problem in two sentences or less, explain what the department tried, and state exactly what decision or support they need from the leadership team. This preserves executive focus while coaching middle managers to solve their own operational challenges.