Week 1 | Weekly Accountability Meeting

In Chapter 15 of The 12 Week Year,  Installing Process Control It states:  

  

That’s one of the things that makes change so challenging. It’s one thing to identify the actions needed to create a better result; it’s another thing to consistently embody them. Without structural and environmental support, follow through becomes a constant exercise of will power. Relying on willpower only has a fatigue factor, sometimes we have the will power and sometimes we don’t. 

 

Process Control is a set of tools and events that help you work your plan even through challenges. Implementing process control uses tools and events to create support structures that can augment, and in some cases take the place of, willpower. There are 2 structures that are shared that will form the foundation of support. The first is the Weekly Plan.

 

The Weekly Plan is a powerful tool that translates the 12 Week Plan into daily and weekly action. It is an instrument that organizes and focuses your week. It becomes your game plan for each week. The weekly plan is a derivative of your 12 Week Plan and it’s not something that you create each week based on what happens to be urgent at the time. Having this level of clarity each week is not only powerful, it’s life changing. The weekly plan is formed from the tactics from the 12 Week plan that are due that particular week. Because it’s connected to your long term vision, you can feel confident that these actions are still in alignment with your plan it just ensures that the weekly plan contains ONLY those actions that are strategic and critical in nature.

 

The second foundational element of process control is Peer Support. Your chances are seven times greater if you employ peer support. The book suggests forming a group of committed individuals to meet weekly. These meeting are called WAMs, which stands for Weekly Accountability Meeting. This meeting is not about trying to hold each other accountable, but rather fostering individual accountability to consistently execute your plan. This tool is used to confront breakdowns, recognize progress, create focus, and encourage action. It lasts about 15-20 mins and the format is pretty straight forward. Each individual gets a few minutes to report out to the group. You speak on your results to date; Are you on track? Ahead? Behind? And next you’ll tell the group your execution score. You also announce your intentions for this week as they relate to your execution. 

 

a. Your results for the 12 Week to Date

 

What’s been working well & how to implement these techniques into one another’s plan.  

 

So each week I will participate in my own WAM. I will be vulnerable and share my journey with my audience as the leader and allow my actions to have an impact on whether you would benefit from the 12 Week Year.

Here is my Weekly Accountability Meeting for Week One:

  

By reflecting and evaluating what you’ve achieved on a weekly basis, you become more aware of where you spend your time. By doing this you’re also able to determine where and how you’re wasting time and address tasks that may be more time consuming than productive. By taking ownership over your journey and being your own leader you can make sure that your 12 Week Year stays on track and that you do not venture away from the vision or the plan.

The only way that you will reach your 12 Week Goals are by taking action on your plan each day. The Weekly Plan and the WAM are two steps in a three step process call the weekly routine. 

Each week you’ll need to schedule about 15 minutes to score and plan your week. 

All are excuses that avoid personal accountability. All of these thoughts and comments are smoke screens that reveal a deeper fear of transparency and accountability.

 

 

 

Pitfall 1: You don’t plan each week.

Getting off to a fast start each week creates momentum and helps you to become more productive throughout the week. In addition to starting the week, other things can get in the way of us taking time to plan the week-including a negative mindset. Maybe one of the following thoughts has slowed you down:

 

 

Pitfall 2: You include all your tasks. 

Keep your weekly weekly plan for only strategic items and commitments.

 

Pitfall 3: You assume each week is the same.

Many make the mistake assuming that each week has the same activity so they create one weekly plan and then copy it each week. It’s possible they look similar , but it’s unlikely that all 12 weeks have the exact same activities due.

 

Occasionally, a tactic may be added to your weekly plan but should not happen frequently preventing you from getting drawn into urgent activities that aren’t strategic.

Pitfall 5: You don’t use it to guide your day.

Once you’ve created your weekly plan, you’ll want to use it daily to keep you on track with the activities that are most important to achieving your goals. Learning to guide your daily activity based on your weekly plan allows your to experience performance break through. 

Routines are an important part of consistent success.