Our leadership team's weekly To-Do completion rate consistently hovers around 80% to 85%, which is just below the 90% standard. Since we are still hitting our quarterly Rocks, why should we care about this gap, and how do we close it?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Accepting an eighty percent to-do completion rate is a slippery slope. While it feels harmless because your quarterly Rocks are still getting done, this minor gap represents a slow leak in your execution engine. It means that fifteen to twenty percent of the commitments your team makes to each other are falling through the cracks every week. Over time, this normalizes a culture of partial accountability where deadlines are treated as optional suggestions rather than firm commitments.

To close this gap without adding micromanagement, you must look at how to-dos are created during the IDS® portion of your Level 10 Meeting™. Often, teams create vague or oversized to-dos that cannot realistically be completed in seven days. A proper to-do is a specific, bite-sized task that can be fully wrapped up before the next weekly pulse. If a task requires three weeks of work, do not write a massive to-do. Instead, write a to-do for the first action step that can be completed this week.

Next, enforce a strict rule during the To-Do List review: tasks are either done or not done. There is no such thing as ninety percent done or working on it. If a task is not complete, it stays on the list, and the owner must briefly state why it was missed. If the same to-do carries over for a second week, it is no longer a scheduling oversight: it is an issue. Drop it to the short-term Issues List and IDS® it. This keeps the focus on systemic blockages rather than personal blame.