Boost Your Scale with the Right Meetings
So, here's the deal--
As you scale, your business needs to have more (not less) meetings.
Why?
Because as you scale your business, you scale your team.
As you scale your team, it’s essential to structure the right meeting cadence to foster -
Alignment
Creativity
Sound strategy creation
But - there’s a common problem that often comes with more meeting. A bureaucratic web of poorly structured, inefficient meetings that result in:
Confusion
Not enough time to execute
Employee frustration and burnout
The solution? Structuring the right meeting cadence, with each meeting having a clearly defined purpose, list of attendees, and agenda.
The result?
Your meetings actually save more time than they take
Higher productivity
Tighter team alignment
High quality vision, strategy and execution planning
Today I’m going to walk you through the proven meeting cadence structure that I used to scale Guardian Bikes, a DTC kids’ bike brand, from a 3-person team to a 20+ person team in 3 short years.
Let’s dive in!
The Annual Planning Meeting
Meeting Purpose: To set revenue, profit, key measurable targets, and 3 to 7 company goals for the next year and the next quarter
Who attends: Every member of your leadership team
How long: 2 full 8-hour days, offsite, away from the office
Day 1 -- Agenda
Conduct an After-Action Review on the previous year.
Team health building exercise.
SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis.
Update the company’s long-range plan, ending with a new 1-year plan for the upcoming year. A long-range plan typically includes the company’s:
Core Values
Reason for existence and mission
High-level 5 or 10-year plan
Marketing strategy
3-year plan
1-year plan
Day 2 -- Agenda
Establish the next quarter’s target revenue, profit, key measurables and key goals.
Discuss and solve key issues.
Summarize next steps, who owns what, and conclude.
The Quarterly Planning Meeting
Meeting Purpose: To set revenue, profit, key measurable targets, and 3 to 7 company goals for the next quarter
Who attends: Every member of your leadership team.
How long: 1 full 8-hour day, offsite, away from the office.
Agenda
Conduct an After-Action Review on the previous quarter.
Review, discuss, debate and realign on the company’s long-range plan, including the company’s:
Core Values
Reason for existence and mission
High-level 5 or 10-year plan
Marketing strategy
3-year plan
1-year plan
Discuss, debate and update the company’s long-range plan, ending with a new 1-year plan for the upcoming year.
Establish next quarter’s target revenue, profit, key measurables and key goals.
Discuss and solve key issues.
Summarize next steps, who owns what, and conclude.
The Weekly Leadership Meeting
Meeting Purpose: To check in on the status of the company’s key numbers, quarterly goals, and solve high priority issues.
Who attends: Every member of your leadership team.
How long: 90 minutes at the same day and time every week, regardless of who can attend.
The Agenda
Share good news.
Review weekly KPI scorecard.
Review quarterly goal status: “on track” or “off track.”
Check in on the status of open action items assigned in previous weekly meetings.
Solve 1 to 6 high priority issues.
Conclude: review newly assigned action items and rate the meeting’s effectiveness on a scale of 1-10.
The 1:1 Meeting with Direct Reports
Meeting Purpose: This meeting exists for leadership team members to provide the support and coaching their direct reports need to successfully execute on their goals and daily responsibilities.
Who attends: Each leadership team member or manager holds this meeting 1:1 with each of his/her direct reports.
How long: 30 to 60 minutes at the same time and day every week.
The Agenda
What updates do you have for me?
What decisions do you need me to make?
What questions do you have for me?
What progress have you made on your quarterly Rocks?
What problems are blocking your progress?
Summary
In conclusion, as your business scales and your team grows, it becomes crucial to establish a well-structured meeting cadence that scales.
While more meetings can often be perceived as a burden, when organized effectively, they can:
Save time
Improve productivity
Foster alignment within your team
By implementing the Annual Planning Meeting, Quarterly Planning Meeting, Weekly Leadership Team Meeting, and 1:1 Meetings with Direct Reports, I can assure you that you’ll be well on your way to achieving your scaling dreams!
Until next time, scale on!
PS -
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