Every quarter we set five Rocks per person, but we keep ending up with half-done projects and excuses about client emergencies. How do we build a culture where Rocks actually get crossed off the list?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

The main reason teams do not finish their Rocks is that they set too many of them, and they are not truly SMART. A Rock must be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely. If a Rock is defined as something vague like improve customer service, it will never get done because nobody knows what finished actually looks like.

- To fix this, change your scoping process during quarterly planning. A Rock must be written down so clearly that any outsider could look at it at the end of ninety days and say yes or no to whether it was completed.

- Limit your team. Each leader should have only one to three Rocks, not five. If everything is important, nothing is.

- Break each Rock down into weekly milestones. If a leader goes two weeks in a row without making progress on a Rock, it must immediately be dropped down to the issues list of your Level 10 Meeting™.

- Do not let your team treat Rocks as extra credit. Rocks are the main event, and daily operational firefighting is what you manage around them. If a leader consistently fails to hit their Rocks, you have a GWC™ issue on your Accountability Chart that needs to be addressed.