The weekly meeting your crew will actually show up for

Why most weekly meetings die by week three

A weekly meeting usually starts with good intentions and dies of one of three things. None of them is the crew's fault.

• It is a status report. The owner talks, everyone else listens, and nothing is decided that could not have been a text.
• Nothing leaves the room with a name on it. "We should fix the scheduling" is agreed every week and fixed never.
• It has no shape, so it runs long. The first topic takes the whole hour and the important one waits until next week.

The fix for all three is the same: a fixed agenda, a fixed length, and one rule about commitments.

The agenda: six parts, 45 minutes

Run the parts in this order, every week, with the minutes as a budget. When a part runs out of time, move on.

Three words do a lot of work here. A Play is a commitment someone will finish within 7 days. A Drive is a bigger push that runs 2 to 12 weeks. A Flag is a problem someone raises so the room can work it.

1. Good News (5 minutes): Around the room, one voice at a time: one personal win and one business win from the last seven days. A sentence each, no discussion.
2. Scoreboard (5 minutes): Read the handful of numbers that tell you how the week went. On track or not, nothing more. Anything off track becomes a problem for later in the meeting, not a conversation now.
3. Drives (5 minutes): The bigger pushes that run for a few weeks. Each owner says on track or off track. Off track goes on the problem list.
4. Plays (5 minutes): Last week's commitments, one at a time: done or not done. Nobody explains, nobody argues. Then the new ones for this week, each with a name and a date.
5. Flags (20 minutes): The problems. This is where the real work happens, which is why it gets the most time. Take the biggest one first, find the cause, decide what to do, and give it to someone with a date.
6. Wrap Up (5 minutes): Read back every new commitment and who owns it, decide what the crew needs to hear, and rate the meeting from one to ten.

Flags gets 20 of the 45 minutes on purpose. Everything before it is reading what is true; that part is fixing what is wrong.

Why the order matters

The order is the argument of the meeting, so keep it even when a week feels different.

• Good news first, because the room should start on what went right. A crew that only hears about problems stops bringing them.
• Numbers before problems, because a number that is off track tells you which problem to work on. Without them, the loudest problem wins.
• Commitments before problems, because last week's promises are checked before new ones are made.
• Problems get the most time and come late, when the room has the facts.
• The wrap up last, because a meeting that does not read back its own decisions has not finished.

Good news, done well

• About thirty seconds each — a sentence per win, not a story.
• No discussion and no follow-ups — if a win raises business, it becomes a Flag or a Play later in the meeting.
• Everyone goes, the person running the meeting goes last.

The rule that makes it work: a name and a date

Every piece of work that leaves the room has exactly one owner and a due date. Not a team, not "we". One person.

Size it by the calendar. If it can be done within 7 days, it is a Play. If it needs 2 to 12 weeks, it is a Drive, and you break it into dated steps so each week has a piece to check. Anything longer than that is two Drives, not one.

Next week, the commitments part of the meeting reads each one back: done or not done. Not done is fine once. Not done twice becomes a problem on the list, because something is in the way.

Problems get worked, not talked about

A problem raised in the meeting gets the same treatment every time:

1. Say it in one sentence. "The Tuesday crew is starting late" is a problem. "Scheduling" is a topic.
2. Find the cause before the fix. Ask why until the answer is something a person can change.
3. Put three possible fixes on the board, then pick one.
4. Give the fix to one person with a date. If it fits in a week, it is a Play; if not, it is a Drive with steps.
5. Solved means solved. Cross it off, and the room sees it go.

Work the most important problem first. If the meeting only gets through one, it got through the right one.

Score the meeting

At the end, everyone in the room rates the meeting from one to ten. Average it and write it down. Under 8, the meeting itself goes on next week's problem list: ask what would have made it a ten.

It takes thirty seconds, and it is the only way a meeting that is drifting gets noticed before people stop coming.

Copy this agenda

Weekly meeting, 45 minutes. Same day, same time, every week.

1. Good News, 5 minutes
2. Scoreboard, 5 minutes
3. Drives, 5 minutes
4. Plays, 5 minutes
5. Flags, 20 minutes
6. Wrap Up, 5 minutes

Bring: the week's numbers, last week's commitments, and the problem list. Leave with: every commitment owned and dated, and a score.

Running it in GameTime OS

This agenda is the Win the Week meeting in GameTime OS, in the same order with the same minutes. The numbers, the commitments and the problems are already on the screen when you start, teammates with their own logins rate the meeting from their phones, and you can change the minutes and the words to fit your business. The order stays fixed, for the reasons above.