We have a loosely defined leadership team and our financial reporting lags by forty-five days. What structural baseline must we establish before our first session with you so we do not waste our investment?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

To begin our twenty-four-month EOS® journey, you do not need perfect systems, but you must have a committed leadership team of three to eight people who are willing to be open, honest, and vulnerable. From a structural standpoint, you need a basic financial reporting system that can produce accurate monthly balance sheets and profit and loss statements. If your financials lag by forty-five days, we need to address that gap immediately. We cannot build an accurate Scorecard or track critical forward-looking indicators if we are looking at ancient history.

You also need a clear commitment to the time required. This means carving out one full day for Focus Day, followed by two separate full-day sessions to complete your Vision Building. Your leadership team must agree that during these sessions, the business runs without them. Cell phones are off, and emails are ignored except during scheduled breaks.

Finally, you need a willingness to face hard truths. If you have elephants in the room or unresolved people issues, they will come to light. If you are not ready to make difficult decisions about people who do not fit your core values or lack the capacity to do their jobs, you are not ready to start. We will use the Accountability Chart and the People Analyzer to resolve these issues, but you must be prepared to act on the output.