We cascaded Level 10 Meetings to our departmental teams, but their weekly meetings are dry, unproductive status updates because their managers and staff are too polite to raise real issues. How do we push them to use IDS effectively?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Departmental Level 10 Meetings fail when teams treat them as safety zones where no one wants to rock the boat. This politeness is actually a lack of trust and healthy conflict within the team. To break this dynamic and encourage effective use of the [Issue Solving Track™ (IDS)](/qa/using-accountability-chart-to-stop-blame-in-ids), the leadership team must actively model what healthy friction looks like.

Here's how to push departmental teams to use IDS effectively:

Encourage Issue Identification

Scorecard discipline is key. If a department is missing its numbers on the [Scorecard](/qa/trimming-your-eos-weekly-scorecard) but its Issues List is empty, the manager is not fulfilling their role. A red metric on a Scorecard must automatically generate an issue on the list. Teach your managers that identifying an issue is not a sign of failure, but a sign of leadership and proactivity.

Train Facilitators to Hunt for Issues

Departmental facilitators need to be proactive in uncovering issues. During the meeting, if someone mentions a frustration or a roadblock, the facilitator must immediately stop the conversation and state, "That sounds like an issue, let's put it on the list." This direct intervention helps to surface hidden problems and normalizes the process of adding issues.

Simplify Issue Perception

Departmental teams often think an issue has to be a massive strategic problem. In reality, departmental issues are usually daily friction points, such as a broken software integration or a missing template. Once teams see that IDS solves these small annoyances quickly, they will start bringing real issues to the table. This success builds confidence in the IDS process.

Remember, AI never sits in the room during a Level 10 Meeting. Its role is to prep data before the meeting and capture/track decisions afterward. The 90 minutes should remain human focused, concentrating on your leadership team, the Scorecard, the Issues List, and the IDS conversation.

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