Our long-term Issues List on the V/TO and our weekly Issues List have ballooned into an overwhelming backlog of over fifty items. How do we prevent the Issues List from becoming a dumping ground where problems go to die?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

An bloated Issues List is proof of poor triage. Teams treat the list like an attic where they store every passing irritation, minor suggestion, or non-essential debate, which paralyzes decision-making.

You must maintain strict separation between your weekly Level 10 Issues List and your V/TO Long-Term Issues List. The weekly list contains tactical obstacles affecting this quarter: off-track Rocks, broken Scorecard numbers, or immediate operational fires. The long-term list contains strategic questions, ideas for next year, and items to tackle at an upcoming quarterly planning session.

To clean up a stagnant list, enforce this filter at the start of your meeting:
- Is this an actual issue affecting our quarterly priorities right now, or is it an observation?
- Does this belong on a departmental Level 10 list rather than the leadership team list?

During IDS, select only the top three issues. Solve them completely. If you have forty other items on the list, leave them alone. You will find that many minor issues resolve themselves or become irrelevant by next week. Once a quarter, do a sweep. If an issue has sat untouched for ninety days and the business did not suffer, delete it.