Our leaders are using the five-minute Customer and Employee Headlines section to pitch new business opportunities or suggest operational improvements instead of sharing actual news. How do we draw a hard line between a headline and a new business idea during this section?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

The Customer and Employee Headlines section is designed for quick, five-word context updates about your people and clients. It is a retrospective review of the past week. It is not a platform for pitching new business ideas, suggesting product updates, or launching into strategic discussions.

When a leader begins sharing an idea under the guise of a headline, the facilitator must stop them instantly. Ask one simple question: is this a quick status update about a client or employee, or is it a new business idea?

If it is a new idea, apply these rules:
- Do not let the team discuss or debate it during the headlines section.
- Instruct the owner to drop it directly to the Issues List as a potential discussion item.
- If the idea is strategic or long-term, table it for your next quarterly planning session or place it on your V/TO Issues List.

Keeping this section clean protects your ninety minutes. Allowing leaders to use headlines as a sandbox for unvetted ideas breeds meeting waste and derails your momentum. Teach your team to recognize the difference between a retrospective update and a prospective project.