The 6 Meetings Every CEO Must Lead

When your whole company works in the same room, news gets around fast. Impromptu meetings, discussions over lunch, and overheard phone calls mean the team usually has a good idea of what’s going on.

But as a company grows, more formal methods of communication are needed to keep everyone in the loop. And when communication breaks down, it leads to a set of common issues. How many of these do you recognise?

• The team aren’t sure of the status. When actions are promised but not followed up, the team can lose trust that anything will happen.

• The team can’t see the big picture. Many people don’t have enough information to understand why certain decisions are taken, or what others are working on.

• The team don’t have clarity on what to do. Expectations are hard to manage, especially when situations change on a regular basis.

• The team sit on feedback for too long. When feedback isn’t given or received, emotional baggage builds up and weighs on everybody’s minds.

• The team feel that their work isn’t recognised. Non-visible work is taken for granted, as are the sacrifices that go into making it happen.

1. Co-founder Connect (2x/wk - weekly)

2. Status updates (weekly)

This is also known as a planning meeting, a leadership meeting, or simply ‘the Monday morning meeting’. Irrespective of name, it’s when the leadership team can review what’s happened, align on the plan for the coming week, and share their blockers. Team members can hold each other accountable for executing their plans by asking good questions.

When there are just a few people, the entire team might attend status updates. However, status updates don’t scale. As roles specialise, every employee’s update becomes less relevant for everyone else. At some point, it makes sense to split a status update in two; one for leaders, and a separate meeting for the entire team (don’t worry — that’s coming up next).

It’s worth spending time on the status update to get it right. If you and your team can leave the meeting with a deep sense of what’s going on, it allows you to step out of a lot of departmental meetings that would otherwise swamp your calendar.

Finishing the week with a status update may sound plausible, but I’ve found that it’s not a great idea in practice. Most status updates end with a sense of urgency, which is better leveraged at the beginning of the week.

The key to a great status update is preparation. When leaders arrive with their metrics updated and a concise report on key questions in their area (rather than making it up on the spot), it buys extra time for discussion and collective problem-solving.

3. All-hands (2x/mo)

Taking questions from the team holds leaders accountable to their employees — and accountability drives better results. That said, leaders don’t need to have an answer for everything and when you don’t know the answer, acknowledge it: ‘That’s a great question and I don’t have the answer. But here’s what we can do to work it out.’

The key to a good all-hands is curation. Ask yourself, ‘What is really important that every single person in the company should know about?’ Keep it relevant so everyone is engaged and energised.

4. One-on-ones (weekly) 

At the end of a one-on-one, you should agree on a set of concrete next steps. If the individual can take them without your help, they must do so or your to-do list will fill up with other people’s action items (a common issue for CEOs).

The key to a great one-on-one is self-restraint. The more you coach and help your team find their own answers, the better off you’ll be in the long run. As my mentor once told me, ‘Coach the person, not the problem.’ The purpose of a one-on-one is to coach individual team members on their personal development by working through issues in their work, and to set expectations on both sides. This might involve reflecting on key challenges, identifying ways to improve, and clarifying priorities.

If you use one-on-ones to review the status of tasks, it might be a sign that you’re too operationally involved in your leaders’ day-to-day tasks. Instead of reviewing tasks and telling them what to do, ask yourself:

‘What are the most important questions I would ask myself if I were in their shoes?

5. Retros (2x/mo)

• What went well?

• What didn’t go well?

• How can we improve?

6. Friday Wins (weekly)