Compartmentalizing

The habit is taught early, because without it a Level 10 Meeting™ is impossible to finish on time. When somebody asks whether the company should open a second location, the right answer in a weekly meeting is to move it to the long-term list. EOS® treats that as a real decision rather than a dodge, since the quarterly exists for that list.

Ninety-minute meetings die when a large question arrives at minute forty. The team either rushes a decision that deserved a day, or spends the hour on it and leaves eight small things unsolved. Sorting by which meeting owns an issue protects both, and it makes people readier to raise big questions because they no longer derail anything.

Worked example: During a weekly meeting at a staffing firm the finance lead asked whether they should stop serving hospitality clients. It was a fair question and completely wrong for a Wednesday. It went to the long-term list, came up at the quarterly with margin figures attached, and took three hours to settle properly with everybody prepared.

Sources: Traction, Gino Wickman, chapter on Issues; Get a Grip, Gino Wickman and Mike Paton