Our leadership team treats the five-minute Good News segue as an informal buffer for late arrivals and laptop setup, delaying our actual start by ten to fifteen minutes every week. How do we eliminate this bad habit and enforce a hard start?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Allowing the segue to function as a waiting room for stragglers corrodes team accountability. When a meeting scheduled for 9:00 AM does not truly kick off until 9:15 AM, the team is signaling that punctuality is optional and leadership time is disposable.

The Level 10 Meeting pulse requires starting on time, ending on time, on the same day, every single week. To kill the buffer mentality, implement three immediate rules:

- The clock dictates the start, not the room. If the meeting starts at 9:00 AM, the Integrator opens the segue at 9:00 sharp, even if three seats are empty. Latecomers walk into a moving train. They do not get caught up, and their missing presence is felt immediately.
- Laptops and notes must be open and loaded before the top of the hour. If leaders are fumbling with cables, logging into dashboards, or pouring coffee at 9:01 AM, they are late.
- The five-minute segue must be strictly structured. Every person shares one piece of personal good news and one piece of professional good news in thirty seconds or less. There is no open floor and no group banter until everyone has spoken.

If a leader routinely wanders in late, treat it as a personnel issue, not a scheduling quirk. Punctuality is the foundation of mutual respect. Starting precisely on time forces every executive to respect the collective rhythm of the business.