All too often, particularly with a smaller and heavily scheduled (and often overworked) staff, regular meetings like the ones that should occur on every Monday morning will get overlooked or even ignored. And if you’re building a client advisory services practice or expanding into other service areas, this is likely not uncommon.
You may have been told this before, but you need to set the tone and make essential meetings happen. The Monday morning action plan sets out to do just that: Put a plan in place for what we can control this week, complete with built-in accountability and necessary items for the team to address throughout the week.
What tends to go wrong — aside from thinking you don’t have the time for such planning meetings — is that all of the learnings from a prior week’s inspirational meetups or conversations get lost. The result is, as expected, that very little of what could be game-changing or on point for your firm to do gets lost, and you and your staff return to their routines. New software doesn’t get researched or tried out, new processes don’t get put into place, and potential partnerships fall by the wayside.
So how do you keep the malaise from happening? How, in fact, do we create a meaningful Monday morning action plan and stay with it?
Keys to a Monday morning plan
First and foremost, you don’t want any plan that addresses process issues or other concerns to be complicated. Start simple, name the issue, date the initial meeting, and identify the vital thing or things you are trying to fix.
Once you have identified the issue you wish to address, then you or the group proposes potential action steps, identifies who will address them, and sets a deadline for a check-in or for the task to be complete.
Next, it’s time to delegate. As a firm leader, you assign who is accountable for a task to be addressed. They will then report to you on progress until it is complete. So, to keep it simple, here’s how to get started in your Monday morning plan:
- Begin with a clear goal. Identify the issue or challenge you want to address and set specific goals. Keep it simple and focused.
- Delegate tasks and assign accountability. Identify team members or resources that can help you, delegate tasks, and assign clear accountability. Set deadlines for progress updates or completion.
- Set actionable steps. Determine the next small, incremental steps to take toward your goal. It could be a specific action or decision that needs to be made or a task that needs to be completed.
- Reflect and adjust. Reflect on the progress made at the end of the day or week, and adjust the plan as needed. Celebrate wins and address any challenges or obstacles. Continuously monitor and adjust the plan to remain effective.
Reminder: Before you wrap up your meeting to execute the Monday morning plan, be sure you identify the goal. We say, “What is winning?” meaning, what does a win mean to you? It’s all about getting to the next action. You may not meet a whole goal, but this is also about taking the step
So how do you get going? Start on the next meeting date and use this template. Put it on the calendar, print it out if you want and follow it. Remember, it’s steps to the goal, not just the goal. Everything you’re doing should be in the template.
Synopsis
The Monday morning action plan is the next smaller, incremental step to get moving after you’ve learned something or identified an issue in your organization. As the leader, you are taking what you’ve learned from any professional experience and applying it.
The problem with not having a plan is that what we learned the week before at a webinar or conference doesn’t always get applied when you return to the office. The only time where we are the coach is when we create a plan for the players (in this case, your staff).
Finally, know that the Monday morning action plan isn’t just for your team, it’s a statement and a promise to yourself. It’s about recognizing the problem and coming up with the right steps to take and changes to make, even if they’re small.
So, next Monday (or at your next general team meeting), pick one thing you are going to do that very day. It’s not anything involved like “I want to overhaul a project management system, etc.” But it’s, “I am going to talk to X today and ask what it is about our system that we can address to make a necessary improvement.”
And always remember, build in accountability. You can check in at the end of the day or end of the week to see that tasks were done. Doing is always greater than knowing!
For more on making the most of your time, see my article, “Time tracking is key to CAS success.“
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