Open-Book Management

It was the first Monday of the quarantine. Our leadership team meeting was about to kick off, and I was looking forward to ‘seeing’ everyone on screen.

As a standard practice, we held our leadership team meetings every Monday morning. The all-company weekly Huddle was on Wednesday morning every week. We decided to keep both of those in place as we entered our new work-from-home lives via video conference.

“Good morning, everyone,” I said at 9:00 a.m. As usual, everyone was on time because we made latecomers sing or do something else silly.

“Let’s kick off with our PVTV. Who wants to do it today?” I asked.

Steve jumped in and nailed it, word for word, resulting in applause around the screen from everyone.

“Thanks, Steve,” I said. “And I know I sound like a broken record, but now more than ever, we need to keep our purpose in mind. We need to always be asking ourselves how we can inspire more happiness in each other, our team, our partners, our community, and most importantly, in ourselves.”

“Rachel, why don’t you kick us off by walking everyone through the dashboard,” I said.

We spent about fifteen minutes talking about current clients, how projects were progressing, and how our new business pipeline was looking. After that, Rachel and I went through the three scenarios we had created. Everyone weighed in. It was an expectedly somber discussion, but productive and thoughtful, and ultimately, everyone came to an agreement.

“I know we already share the numbers with people at the weekly Huddle,” Ahmet said. “But maybe we should also provide a real-time scoreboard that shows the contingencies we will be sharing with them. We could show all three scenarios so that they could be as informed as possible.”

“I’m not sure about that,” said Steve. “People might panic if they see the numbers not looking good for the following month. We don’t need our team members even more distracted, worrying about the future.”

Martha, our head of HR, jumped in. “I think we all have to give the team more credit than that, Steve. They can handle this, and don’t you think we want them to be able to make gradual and preparatory changes to their spending and home budgets, just in case?”

The debate carried on for about ten more minutes. I had learned over time to sit back and let my leadership team hash out a problem before I weigh in. Even though I often wish it didn’t, my voice as CEO carried more weight, and I didn’t want to influence the argument or make it sound like I took a side. In almost every case, the team coalesced around the right idea. This was one such case.

“Okay, that was a great discussion, and it sounds like everyone is on the same page. We will create a real-time dashboard for the entire company to view, and it will have our contingency plans built-in. Let’s try to have that ready by Wednesday when we announce the plans in Huddle.”

Key point: Consider an open-book management style. It can feel uncomfortable sharing your finances with your team, but it will pay off in spades with increased trust and better problem-solving. Communication builds trust, and trust is what makes any team work.

We were getting close to the end of the meeting. As I always did, I asked, “Does anyone have anything else to share?”

“Yes,” said Steve. “Let’s stay as close to our clients as possible. I’m talking with Mark on Friday.” Mark was the CMO of RedBrick, our largest and longest-standing account.

“Great idea. I’m talking with Shera, too.” Shera was the CEO of SalesLive, who we’d been working with for about a year. “Everyone, if you have the chance to check in on a client, please do so. Partnership with our clients and knowledge about how they’re doing is everything. If we are blindsided by changes on their end, we limit our ability to make good decisions. The sooner we know, the better we can prepare.”

Everyone agreed, and we all disconnected.

Key point: During a crisis, knowledge is everything. Stay close to your customers and partners, and share liberally with your leadership team (and overall team when appropriate). The name of the game is agility. The more you know, the better you can react.