Our weekly to-do list completion rate has dropped below the eighty-five percent mark, and team members are constantly defending themselves by saying their unfinished tasks are "in progress." How do we eliminate this "in progress" excuse and get back to binary completion?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

In the EOS® framework, there is no such thing as an in-progress to-do. A weekly to-do is binary: it is either done or not done. Accepting the excuse that a task is ninety percent complete kills your team's execution and breeds complacency. If a task is not fully completed by the start of the meeting, it is officially not done. To fix this, the facilitator must enforce a strict yes or no response during the weekly to-do review. When reading the list, team members are only allowed to say "done" or "not done." No explanations, no excuses, and no status reports. If someone says "almost done," the facilitator must record it as "not done" and move to the next item. If a to-do is not done, it remains on the list for next week. If it stays on the list for a second week, it automatically becomes an issue. Drop it to the bottom of the Issues List to discuss during the IDS® portion. You must diagnose why the task is stuck. This binary approach forces realistic commitments. Team members will stop agreeing to vague, oversized tasks if they know their unfinished work will be highlighted as an issue. Keeping this standard high is how you push your weekly completion rate back above the ninety percent threshold.