Chad Silverstein shares a leadership rhythm that builds accountability: weekly scorecard reviews, quarterly 90-day planning, and company-wide state-of-the-company meetings. He maps every function into boxes with 3-5 responsibilities each, then places people into the right seat. One top performer didn't belong on the leadership row, a hard call that freed them both.
Chapters
Quarterly, we had a state of the company meeting, telling all the company and the employees kind of where we've been, where we are and where we're going. And there were certain exercises that we would embed into those meetings that really kept it healthy, it really kept the team connected. And then being able to come back to the company and have a state of the company meeting and then connect everybody to that made everybody feel like they were part of something. So we had this meeting pulse that I was doing a weekly meeting every single week with my leadership team at the same time, same place, every week, hitting those issues, knocking things out. And then quarterly, we had a state of the company meeting. And right before the state of the company meeting, where we were telling all the company and the employees kind of where we've been, where we are and where we're going, I met with the leadership team and we did our quarterly meeting as a leadership team to set our next 90 day goals and to make sure that we were on pace to, to hit our annual goals. So we constantly had this pulse of the business where we're meeting every week, we're looking at our scorecard every single week, the most important numbers, hearing the most important headlines, the most important things going on around the company. And then we were meeting every 90 days to talk about the last 90 day goals and then making sure that we're on pace to hit that next that at the end of the year. And there were certain exercises that we would embed into those meetings that really kept it healthy, it really kept the team connected. And then being able to come back to the company and have a state of the company meeting and then connect everybody to that made everybody feel like they were part of something and that was so powerful. And then when you add in some of the other things I'm gonna share that we did, it just transformed us. I mean, it really took us from like night to day and it was a difference maker for us. I think every company has those things that kind of just like shift everything. And eos for us, that operating system for us was one of them because it's simple. I mean, we had a two page business plan that showed our core values, our 10 year vision, our marketing strategy, which was like three bullets, our three year picture of where we could see things, and then our quarterly goals and our yearly goals and it was like accountability through the roof because eyes are on you. So one of the things that was very powerful for us, and it was an interesting story of what happened. We showed up as a leadership Team to our first kind of team building exercise that we were working through with one of their sections of this program. And it was about building accountability into your company. Which, you know, most teams fail with accountability either because of a failure of nerve from the leader because they're too scared to call people out, or because they suck at it. And they make people feel really uncomfortable having to call people out. But at the end of the day, like if you think about a sports team, the coach has to call people out. And as a leader, if you're really super nice and you're trying to be a people pleaser, that's a difficult thing to be a able to do, is keep everybody happy, yet call you out. And so there are things that we learn as leaders that we have to do. We talked about it last time, you know, getting your ratios right, making sure that you catch people doing good things. So that when I have to hit you in the head with some feedback, it's not the only time you've ever heard from me. But we showed up at this leadership team meeting and what they did was, is they put our business on a whiteboard and they asked us to get very clear on what functions existed in our business. And every business has functions, right? And the problem with most teams is they'll build their business around people. And you can't do that. As important as people are, you can't build around people because if that person leaves, then what. So what we did was, is we would mark this up on the board and we had finance as a department, a function. We had sales, we had operations, we had it. And so you just have. Every company has those. And so there's some anomalies that some companies will have. Some people might have a marketing in their main function and some may not. We didn't. We had marketing under sales. It wasn't a major function of our business since we didn't pour a lot of energy and money and time into our marketing because we had salespeople. So once a team gets clarity on what those departments are and you call them boxes, then you decide like, what are the most important three to five responsibilities of that function. So again, something simple. Sales. You know, one of the functions is get new clients. You know, one of the functions is retain the current clients. You know, you might have something like it. You know, you're going to be, you're going to be the point person for any it, you know, breakdowns or challenges, cybersecurity, whatever it is. And once you get clear on what functions exist in Your business that are major functions. And then you determine what are those three to five main responsibilities for that function. Then you put the person in, and this is the right person, right seat, making sure that you have the right people in there. And when you go and you figure this out and you're doing it backwards because, you know, we already had a team, we already had people in position and titles, and all of a sudden, we're throwing those out the door, and we're throwing these up on the board. And one of my best employees in 25 years, she was definitely one of our highest performers. Didn't end up in a box. And so imagine having a leadership team that has trust and has people there who've been there 5, 10, 15 years showing up at this meeting, learning how to take your company through the roof, and finding out that the one person who's probably one of the highest performers doesn't belong there. They can't be in that meeting. And, boy, that was tough. It was tough for me as a leader, and it was really tough for me. Why not make a box for her? Because you don't do that. Because you don't build your business around individuals, and everyone has a role. She had a very important role in our company. It just wasn't on that top row. And I think it was something that she had to grow through. We had to grow through. And ironically, she ended up, long story short, kind of looking backwards, being on the leadership team when some of the other people were not on the leadership team. So things do evolve over time. And she was a high performer. I mean, that's what she did. And people have those kind of things happen to them in their career, and this is the true sign of a leader. And they either react to it going one way and say, you know what? They screwed me over. I'm out of here. Or they step up and they know their role in the company, and they play that part and they earn their keep. And this individual did that. She did such a great job. And she really. It's such an inspiration to me, thinking back at how she handled the situation, as hard as it was.
