Dan Martell - 5 Team Meetings You Need To Grow Your Business

00:00:00.000 Hey there.

00:00:00.500 Dan Martell here, serial entrepreneur, investor,

00:00:02.160 and creator of SaaS Academy.

00:00:03.240 In this video, I'm going to share with you

00:00:05.080 the five meetings you need to have in your software business

00:00:08.920 to truly grow.

00:00:10.080 And be sure to stay at the end.

00:00:11.160 We're going to share with you how to get access

00:00:13.400 to my weekly sync agenda, which is one of the five meetings.

00:00:17.800 I'm going to walk you through that

00:00:19.200 to make sure you get the most out of your team.

00:00:21.600 Let's get going.

00:00:30.000 A long time ago, I was building a company called Spheric.

00:00:37.600 I was 24 when I started the company.

00:00:40.360 And it grew like crazy, 150% year over year.

00:00:43.680 We started hiring people.

00:00:44.820 I think we were about 20 folks.

00:00:46.360 When I finally realized that I was running around

00:00:48.940 like a chicken with his head cut off,

00:00:50.320 I was trying to do everything.

00:00:51.840 I was being involved in the sales meetings, the marketing

00:00:54.140 meetings, the delivery, talking to clients, doing the work,

00:00:57.820 accounting, process, picking up mail at the PO box,

00:01:01.960 doing everything and not truly with any structure.

00:01:06.380 And what I've discovered, I read a book called Good to Great

00:01:08.620 by Jim Collins, which really set me down the path of like,

00:01:11.920 oh, great companies actually have a operating model.

00:01:15.480 I call it the company OS.

00:01:16.860 They have an operating system for how

00:01:19.040 they grow their business.

00:01:20.360 And if you study the highest performing companies,

00:01:22.740 they all follow similar patterns in regards

00:01:25.120 to the way the communication flows

00:01:26.940 and how they schedule and they run their meetings.

00:01:29.460 And that set me down this path of reading a bunch of books,

00:01:31.740 like Scaling Up, and Traction by Gina Wickman,

00:01:35.080 and Double Double by Cameron Harreld.

00:01:37.460 And literally, if there's been a book written

00:01:39.880 around operating models, high output management

00:01:43.120 by Andy Grove, et cetera, et cetera, I've read it.

00:01:45.600 And Meetings Suck, another one by Cameron Harreld

00:01:48.720 that will give you a lot of color into meetings.

00:01:51.320 But I really believe that there's five meetings

00:01:53.920 that if you implement, it will transform your business.

00:01:57.100 These are non-negotiables.

00:01:58.400 When I start companies, we implement, we instruct.

00:02:01.300 I give the guidance on how to do these things

00:02:03.880 because they are the 80-20.

00:02:05.800 These are the five meetings.

00:02:06.760 You add them to the way your team communicates,

00:02:09.520 and you will build consistent, repeatable momentum.

00:02:12.520 If you don't, you will be floundering and struggling

00:02:15.480 and feeling like nothing's getting done to your standards.

00:02:18.920 And once I implemented these meetings into SPHERIC,

00:02:21.460 it allowed us to continue our growth curve

00:02:24.400 over a four-year period to eventually building

00:02:26.080 one of the fastest growing companies in Canada

00:02:27.760 and getting acquired by a US firm when I was 28.

00:02:32.180 And the reason why is because you build a company that's

00:02:34.660 well-managed, and people will see the value in that.

00:02:37.420 So I want to walk you through those five meetings

00:02:39.340 in this episode.

00:02:41.180 Number one, the daily stand-up.

00:02:43.580 So the way this works is you may have heard of daily huddles

00:02:47.540 or stand-up meetings, et cetera.

00:02:48.640 I got this from building software in the Scrum model.

00:02:52.540 But the way to do this is really simple, OK?

00:02:55.340 Is you ask, what are the three things you did yesterday?

00:02:57.620 So everybody stands up.

00:02:58.560 That's why it's called a stand-up, everybody stands up.

00:03:01.060 And you ideally want to do it at the department level

00:03:03.700 if you have a big company, and then roll that up

00:03:05.860 into the exec leadership teams at each one.

00:03:08.260 But it shouldn't take more than 30 seconds per team member.

00:03:11.740 What did you do yesterday?

00:03:12.820 What are the three big rocks you accomplished?

00:03:14.320 What are the three things you're going to accomplish today?

00:03:16.540 What's on your list?

00:03:17.320 What do you want to do today with your time?

00:03:19.020 And then third, are you blocked?

00:03:20.560 Are you stuck?

00:03:21.080 Is there anything you need to move forward?

00:03:23.580 And that's it.

00:03:24.240 So they said, OK, yesterday I did this, I did this, I did this.

00:03:27.440 Today I'm planning on crushing this, this, and this.

00:03:29.760 And I'm blocked because I'm waiting on this person

00:03:31.620 to get back to me for this template

00:03:32.920 because I can't move forward on that.

00:03:34.300 And what happens is as a leader, as a founder,

00:03:36.320 your job is to listen to the blockers,

00:03:38.720 A, make sure that they're working on the right thing.

00:03:40.660 So sometimes people aren't pulling

00:03:42.280 on the rope in the same direction,

00:03:43.840 meaning that you could have one piece of rope that

00:03:47.440 splits off to five people on your team,

00:03:49.000 and they're all pulling in different direction,

00:03:50.380 which means nobody's really moving in the right direction.

00:03:52.540 So you want to make sure everybody's aligned,

00:03:54.460 and that if there's anything slowing down, creating friction,

00:03:57.640 that you unblock and unstuck.

00:03:59.220 That is the role, one of the many roles,

00:04:01.360 of a founder as a leader for your team.

00:04:04.660 So number one is the daily standout.

00:04:07.180 Number two, the weekly sync.

00:04:09.120 So this is a framework I created in the structure,

00:04:11.280 but it's a weekly meeting.

00:04:13.280 At the end of the day, you want to do a few things really well.

00:04:15.480 But you want to synchronize your team

00:04:18.740 towards the bigger vision.

00:04:20.160 So you want to make sure that you're

00:04:21.840 looking at your scorecard, you're

00:04:23.180 understanding how the big rocks that you've designed

00:04:25.760 for the quarter are moving forward.

00:04:27.520 And you want to make sure that any issues that have come up

00:04:30.360 that you discuss them in those meetings in context.

00:04:33.580 Too often, people, individuals, are

00:04:35.220 having debates and discussions around challenges,

00:04:39.300 but they don't have all the information.

00:04:40.800 They don't have the right people in the cubicle

00:04:44.420 or in the office or in the meeting room

00:04:46.180 to actually have that proper conversation.

00:04:48.440 So it's better to just add it to the weekly sync

00:04:50.360 and create that space for everybody

00:04:52.220 to discuss, solve, and move forward.

00:04:54.720 So that's the weekly sync.

00:04:55.940 It's for the team to synchronize on a weekly basis

00:04:58.660 around the metrics on a weekly basis,

00:05:01.500 the big rocks that they're moving forward in the quarter,

00:05:03.960 and ideally, the issues.

00:05:05.260 There's more elements of the agenda.

00:05:06.780 I'll share more at the end.

00:05:07.860 But that, at a high level, is the purpose

00:05:09.620 of the weekly meeting.

00:05:11.240 Number three, monthly reviews.

00:05:13.340 So if you've done things properly in your planning,

00:05:15.740 we'll talk more about that in a second,

00:05:17.360 then every month you should be doing a monthly review

00:05:20.240 to just see how things are going.

00:05:22.400 Double click, dive into the projects,

00:05:24.740 dive into the status, kind of like a show and tell.

00:05:28.760 If people are moving forward and they're like,

00:05:30.500 let's say somebody's migrating your Google Docs to Airtable,

00:05:34.080 for example, as a big project.

00:05:35.840 Show us what you've created.

00:05:37.340 If it's a two-month-long project,

00:05:39.140 I'm a big fan in those monthly reviews,

00:05:41.240 is just share with the team.

00:05:43.400 What's going on?

00:05:44.300 How does that look?

00:05:45.140 If you're customer success and you're

00:05:46.400 building new case studies for your marketing team

00:05:48.640 or for your website, show us what you got.

00:05:50.960 Let's see.

00:05:51.580 Like, don't wait.

00:05:52.760 I think too often, people want to wait till things are perfect.

00:05:56.300 I think in the monthly review, yes,

00:05:57.480 you want to review the previous month.

00:05:58.940 How are you guys doing?

00:05:59.720 What's planned for the next month?

00:06:01.040 Is everything green, red, or yellow?

00:06:03.340 I agree.

00:06:03.840 But I also say, take the opportunity

00:06:06.500 to just do a little show and tell on a monthly basis

00:06:09.200 so that everybody in the organization

00:06:10.580 can kind of be proud of the work they're doing

00:06:12.320 and proud of the progress they're making.

00:06:14.060 And everybody else feel like, oh,

00:06:15.260 I actually understand what that department's doing

00:06:16.820 or this person is doing or I understand

00:06:18.440 how this project is going to fit into the work I'm doing.

00:06:20.780 I think it's just a really great cadence on a monthly basis

00:06:23.540 to reset and share kind of how the company is doing.

00:06:27.920 Number four, quarterly planning.

00:06:30.500 So one of the things that I think is very important

00:06:33.220 is on a 90-day sequence.

00:06:35.000 My buddy, Todd Herman, says he has a program called

00:06:37.520 The 90 Day Year, that really the truest fidelity or ability

00:06:43.620 to plan is about 90 days.

00:06:45.260 After 90 days, sure, you can be directionally focused

00:06:49.640 on what you want to get done, but you really can't tell.

00:06:52.240 You have no clue how the stuff that you're doing right now

00:06:54.400 is going to, what the impact is going to be,

00:06:56.000 and how that's going to materialize into momentum

00:06:59.360 into the following quarter.

00:07:00.660 So every 90 days, I think it's really

00:07:02.600 important to step back, look at the previous period,

00:07:05.780 see how you've done, take those lessons learned.

00:07:07.880 If there's anything that didn't get done,

00:07:09.140 move them forward in the next quarter.

00:07:11.060 And then with that knowledge, reset and re-evaluate

00:07:15.560 the 90 days going forward.

00:07:17.780 And lock those in, set the metrics, and move forward.

00:07:20.600 But it's just really healthy to ideally off-site,

00:07:23.820 go outside of your office every 90 days for one day minimum

00:07:27.980 as a team, and just reset the plan, reset the vision,

00:07:31.320 reset the quarter for the following one coming up.

00:07:33.900 And make sure that you take everything you've learned

00:07:35.700 in the previous 90 days and bring those forward

00:07:38.100 in the following 90 days.

00:07:39.140 And that, on a quarterly basis, is a must.

00:07:42.120 And some people are like, well, I'll do it every four months.

00:07:44.220 You can.

00:07:44.720 I'm just telling you, you're not going to grow as fast.

00:07:46.480 The teams that pulse together faster grow the faster.

00:07:50.160 And pulse means more often they're

00:07:52.140 communicating and realigning strategy.

00:07:53.760 More often they're connecting, talking

00:07:55.680 about strategic vision and aligning everything

00:07:58.180 to make sure that it's making sense.

00:07:59.760 90 days for me is the absolute best time

00:08:03.900 to make sure that that happens.

00:08:05.000 And every four months just feels a little slow

00:08:07.380 and could be a little faster if you go every quarter.

00:08:10.000 Number five, yearly strategic planning.

00:08:12.560 So the yearly plan is way different than the quarterly

00:08:14.980 because the quarterly is looking at what you've already

00:08:17.920 designed in your yearly planning to get done in that quarter

00:08:21.800 and understanding the sequencing of projects

00:08:24.340 and why they're designed in that order.

00:08:26.320 Sure, you can move them out of sequence,

00:08:28.240 But in regards to throwing away a full big project

00:08:31.900 or changing product strategy, you're

00:08:33.540 not going to do that on a quarterly basis.

00:08:35.920 On an annual basis, on your yearly strategic planning,

00:08:39.160 you're going to look at the previous 12 months,

00:08:41.240 take all the lessons learned moving forward.

00:08:43.800 Then you're going to look at a 10-year target,

00:08:46.900 a three-year vision, and one-year goals for the business,

00:08:50.860 and using that kind of vision for where you want to end up

00:08:55.220 in 10 years and being really clear what

00:08:56.980 are the five to seven things that you're

00:08:58.640 going to want to accomplish.

00:09:00.040 Then you can work backwards and really

00:09:02.160 set a one-year plan that's going to align with the three-year

00:09:05.260 and eventually the 10-year.

00:09:06.940 That shouldn't be done.

00:09:08.260 See, what happens is too often when you're

00:09:09.740 having meetings with your team, you're

00:09:11.220 talking about stuff that are very strategic and long term

00:09:15.040 out of context for when those conversations should

00:09:17.260 be happening.

00:09:18.280 So anytime I'm talking to a team member,

00:09:20.140 and they're like, we should really

00:09:21.760 consider getting into this line of business.

00:09:23.740 I go, that sounds like a great strategic discussion

00:09:26.680 at our annual planning offsite so that everybody

00:09:29.180 can understand your perspective and kind of why

00:09:31.060 you think it's important.

00:09:32.200 But unfortunately, it's just not a now thing.

00:09:33.880 Does that make sense?

00:09:34.560 They go, yeah, perfect.

00:09:35.560 Let's add it to the strategic planning documents.

00:09:38.320 We just have a document for our strategic plan.

00:09:41.000 We have the quarters, and then we have an annual.

00:09:42.740 And they just add it to the discussion list.

00:09:44.680 Why is that awesome?

00:09:46.000 Because then they feel like they've been heard.

00:09:47.860 They don't bring it up in another meeting.

00:09:49.660 They don't try to politically get the project started,

00:09:52.960 kicked off R&D research outside of the right timing for it.

00:09:58.480 And you end up talking about projects that are now things,

00:10:02.640 not later things.

00:10:03.680 And I think too often, as a leader,

00:10:05.540 we need to explain to people like, hey,

00:10:07.460 we have a strategy for a reason.

00:10:08.680 So get everybody aligned with that strategy.

00:10:11.880 If you come in and you keep adding stuff

00:10:13.720 that is totally a right turn or a left turn,

00:10:16.440 then we're going to slow ourselves down.

00:10:18.380 The right time to do that is maybe in a quarterly meeting

00:10:21.240 or an annual strategic review, but it's not now.

00:10:24.640 And I think creating that annual offsite two days

00:10:27.940 and spending time really looking over the numbers

00:10:29.820 for the previous period,

00:10:31.180 and then looking at the next 12 months

00:10:33.120 with a three-year horizon and a 10-year horizon

00:10:35.740 to make sure that everybody's aligned with that vision

00:10:38.120 and then building a plan against that,

00:10:40.200 that's how we move fast, that's how we create momentum,

00:10:42.700 and that's how we avoid wasting time today,

00:10:44.860 talking about things that are not now conversations.

00:10:47.720 So quick recap, five meetings you should be having

00:10:50.180 to grow your software business.

00:10:51.500 Number one, your daily stand-ups.

00:10:53.060 Number two, weekly syncs.

00:10:54.920 Three, monthly reviews.

00:10:56.540 Four, quarterly planning.

00:10:57.900 And five, yearly strategic planning.

00:11:00.420 So as I mentioned at the beginning of this episode,

00:11:02.240 I want to share with you my exclusive weekly sync

00:11:05.120 framework.

00:11:05.820 In it, I talk about the agenda structure

00:11:07.820 that I use to run my companies.

00:11:10.940 The most unique parts that are never discussed,

00:11:13.400 and you can click the link down below to get your copy,

00:11:16.460 is things like the announcements, the customer

00:11:19.140 headlines.

00:11:19.640 Go check out my framework, because I

00:11:21.240 think it'll give you more breadth for what

00:11:23.700 might be missing to really create excitement

00:11:26.240 and motivation amongst your team,

00:11:28.240 and not just make it all about trying to check in

00:11:30.360 and hold people accountable.

00:11:31.380 We want to celebrate as much as we want to resolve issues.

00:11:34.700 So you can click the link below to download

00:11:36.280 your copy of the Weekly Sync.

00:11:38.120 If you like this video, be sure to lightly tap the Like button.

00:11:41.460 Share this video with anybody you care about that you feel

00:11:43.600 that they could serve.

00:11:44.760 And as for usual, I want to challenge you to live a bigger

00:11:46.560 life and a bigger business, and I'll see you next Monday.

00:11:49.140 You

Dan Martell - December 16, 2019

5 Team Meetings You Need To Grow Your Business

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