Execution Excellence

19How Should the First Meeting Run?And How Frequently?

Introduction

Finally, you reach the day to do the first strategy execution review using the Balanced Scorecard (BSC). As a CEO, you have ensured your presence, your BSC coordinator has ensured a good first reporting deck, you have blocked two hours on your calendar, and you have ensured that all members of your executive committee are present for this in person or over a video link. (No conference calls, please. They just don't work.)

The meeting should happen before the seventh day of the month (the window between the fifth and seventh is ideal) or you will not have time to benefit from your findings during the next month. The data should be available in your management information system (MIS) in time for you to prepare. If it is not, you need to fix that problem immediately, as it impacts the overall performance of an enterprise. An enterprise should be tracking its performance on key metrics on a daily basis, and the month-end number is simply an aggregation of the daily data. I would not give more than 48 hours to aggregate the month's data, meaning it should be ready by no later than the third day of the month.

The first meeting, and every meeting that follows, will run a similar course, covering the five steps shown in Figure 19.1.

Figure 19.1 First Meeting

Deck Pre-distribution

The first BSC deck should be distributed ...