Our leadership team arrives at our weekly Level 10 Meeting™ with an empty Issues List, and we waste the first ten minutes of our IDS® block trying to think of problems to solve on the spot. How do we build a habit of pre-populating the Issues List throughout the week so we can jump straight into high-value problem solving?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

An empty Issues List at the start of a Level 10 Meeting™ is never a sign of a perfect business. Instead, it indicates that your team is compartmentalizing their work and only thinking about organizational challenges when they are sitting in the meeting room. This leads to weak, top-of-mind problem solving rather than addressing real, deep-seated issues.

To fix this, you must change how your team captures challenges during the week. Issues do not happen on a schedule; they occur in real-time as your team interacts with clients, manages operations, and executes on projects.

Instruct every leader to add issues to the Level 10 Meeting™ agenda the moment they arise during the week. If a client is unhappy on Tuesday, it should go on the list on Tuesday, not when the meeting starts on Thursday. This ensures that the issues are documented with accurate context while they are fresh.

The Integrator must lead by example. If a team member brings a challenge to you mid-week that requires leadership input, do not solve it in the hallway. Tell them to put it on the Level 10 Meeting™ Issues List. By building this continuous capture habit, you ensure your agenda is always loaded with real, pre-considered challenges, allowing your team to maximize every minute of the IDS® block.