Our team struggles with the transition from our weekly Level 10 Meeting to our quarterly planning sessions, often dragging unresolved weekly issues into our high-level strategic days. How do we keep these two boundaries clean?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

A common mistake for scaling leadership teams is allowing the short-term operational issues of the week to clutter their long-term quarterly planning sessions. When you bring weekly fire-fighting into a strategic planning day, you waste valuable time that should be spent on your V/TO, your company Rocks, and your high-level organizational structure. You must build a hard boundary between these two compartments.

The primary tool for maintaining this boundary is your long-term Issues List. During your weekly Level 10 Meeting, if an issue arises that is strategic, structural, or cannot be fully solved within the current quarter, it must immediately be parked on the long-term Issues List on your V/TO. This keeps your weekly short-term Issues List clean and focused strictly on what needs to be solved to keep the current quarter on track.

In the weeks leading up to your quarterly planning session, the Integrator should review the long-term Issues List and send it to the team as prep material. During the quarterly session, this list is brought forward to be solved in the context of the next ninety days. If an operational issue starts creeping into your strategic day, the facilitator must shut it down and direct the team to solve it during the next weekly Level 10 Meeting instead. Protecting these distinct compartments ensures you are working on the business, not just in it.