Are you Asking the Right Questions?

As the Client Success Coach, I get the privilege to speak and work with practice owners around the world and so many of the issues that are shared with me can be resolved by simply pulling the team out of the business for the day to work on the business. 

I know for most owners this strikes fear into their souls but TRUST ME, it is worth it! 

I have hands-on experience and knowledge to guide you to success for these days. Inner Circle Members have access to my training calls and to book to speak to me directly about these days if you have any further questions on them.

During this article, I am going to build out and highlight the process of running a smooth and effective Annual Planning Meeting. Please note, when it comes to business structure nothing anyone teaches is new, in fact, what we base our guidance on is a blend of Gino Wickman’s Traction, Verne Harnish’ Scaling up and Dan Bradbury’s Mastermind training. They all model one another but the main point is that THEY WORK! 

When should I do an annual planning meeting and should I do a quarterly meeting? 

Annual Planning Meetings should happen at the start of your financial year – Ideally in alignment with the financial quarters of the year. So if your Year-end was 31st Dec then your Annual Planning meeting should be scheduled for January, If it’s March 31st then book it in for April. 

Your Annual Planning meeting differs from the Quarterly as it allows you to look back on the past full financial year with true financial clarity, with your true profit and loss for the previous year prepared prior to the meeting. This is also the meeting whereby we reset your one-page business plan, In the Ryan Rieder Proven Process, we call this the Vision Reality Document. 

Typically annual planning meetings are advised to run over two days however Ryan always makes it work as a one-day event, saving you from having to take people out of the business for too long. This does mean context needs to set and staying on track is crucial!

 For best results, they should be held off-site.  

Who attends the Annual Planning meeting? 

Typically, both Annual Planning and Quarterlies are reserved for only the business builders/ the people that sit in the key seats in your business (Visionary, Integrator, Operations, Sales/ Marketing and Finance). However, depending on the size of your clinic, it can be appropriate to ask your whole team to attend. 

Pre Annual Planning Prep Work 

The True success of an Annual Planning Day comes from the work that goes into preparing for it. This preparation should be split based on people’s seats within the business i.e. Finance looks after the breakdown of numbers, the Practice Manager looks at the non-financial stats and the Visionary/ Business owner will prepare to predict the next year’s goals. 

I am fully aware that not everyone has a team to lean on in this way but maybe this is your year to start freeing yourself up

Checklist for Annual Planning Prep Work 

❏Financial Review of previous year as a total and broken down into quarters

❏Print and Prepare 1 x of each document for each person attending:

❏Last Year’s  Vision Reality Document (if you do not have a current one you will work on creating one at your next meeting)

❏Blank Version of 1 Page Business Plan (Vision Reality Document)

❏Copy of your Organisational Chart  (if you have one)

❏Up to date Scorecard reflecting Yearly and Quarters Numbers

❏An item to be the ‘elephant in the room’ can be as simple as a stapler but I recommend a small toy

❏Ask your team to come prepared with: 

a. What they would like to achieve as a practice in the next year

b.Their 3 Business Greats/ Wins for the previous year

c.  Read the quick review of 5 Dysfunctions of a Team ( available to Inner Circle Members in your portal under my training on Annual Planning Meetings) 

• Visionary – Schedule in a clarity break away from the business for you to decide on your vision over the next 1,3, and 5 years (You will be sharing this at the meeting) – This is SUPER important do not skip over this, I know booking an hour away from the business and your busy life is scary but TRUST ME it will serve you tenfold! 

• Visionary/ Finance Seat – Get prepared to predict revenue, profit, sales and any other key measurables for the year and quarter ahead ( This is why preparing your actual yearly and quarterly figures in crucial prior to the day) 

• Plan an Active Lunch – there will be no time for the team to head out and get their own so we normally organise a team lunch in advance

• Healthy Snacks for the day

• Flipchart/ Whiteboard and Pens 

• Prepare Room Day Before and arrange for a team to arrive 15 mins early for a prompt start time 

• Agenda Printed out and day run by Practice Manager (ideally) – Having an agenda outlined for your day will take the pressure off and ensure all the important outcomes for the day are covered. I have highlighted the very important role of notetaker and their prompts for the day in green.

Annual Planning Agenda

1. Check-In 

2. 1 Year Review 
   1. Numbers 
   2. Goals 

3. Quarter Review
   1. Measurables 
   2. Rocks

Break 

4. 5 Dysfunctions of a Team ( Summary Sheet) 

5. Overview of Trust Builders

6. SWOT Analysis

7. Business Focussed Check-Up 

8. Issue Collation 

Lunch 

9. Build New Vision Reality Document 

10. 3 Year Picture 

Break

11. 1 Year Picture

12. 90 Day Plan

13. Issues – PBST 

14. Feedback

Annual Planning Day Breakdown

“It’s not about content, it’s about context” Ryan Rieder 

Setting up context about how the annual planning day will proceed is how we run a harmonious day, Before you start, Write up the Agenda on your flipchart and a list of the rules for the day, this will show the overview of what the team will achieve today and how important this day is for open and honest communication. 

Context Setting  (10 Mins) 

Acknowledgement – Thank the team for being here, they are dedicating a full day to work on the business with you, do not take the fact they are here lightly “the secret to success is to show up” as Ryan likes to say!

Objectives –  explain the reasons you are getting together – to review the past year, celebrate the successes, address the issues and get clear on our vision for the year ahead. 

Rules for the Day 

•Offline – No Mobile’s / Screens – we will be having regular breaks to check devices 

•All Break together – if one person needs to stop we all stop 

•Play 100% – we are all in and we don’t always need to agree 

•Be Open – Introduce the ‘Elephant in the Room’ as your tool – this gives the holder of the ‘Elephant in the Room’ the permission to really say what is on their mind with no judgement or backlash. 

Capture own issues – to prevent us from getting sidetracked, please ask each team member to allocate a page in their notebooks for the issues they capture throughout the annual planning process. We allocate time to collate and capture everyone’s issues near the end of the day

•Notetaker – Allocate a notetaker for the day. The Visionary is not allowed to be the notetaker for the day – Their role today is to listen to the conversations and capture issues and to-do’s during every share so chose someone that is attentive. 

•Permission to Interrupt –   “It is important we stay on track today – do I have everyone’s permission to interrupt you if we are going off track?”(Show of hands)

1. Check-In This is a quiet writing exercise, ask your team to take a few minutes to reflect on the last year in business and write down: 

1. 3 Business Wins/ Greats 
2. An Unexpected Business Achievement (something that may have happened that was brilliant for business that we hadn’t necessarily planned for) 
3. Personal Great – this could be weddings, children milestones, house moves 
4. Expectations for the Day

Once everyone has finished writing, ask for a volunteer to share all 4 of their responses then go around the room clockwise from this person.

 The Notetaker will listen to the answers and is to make a list of any issues that may come up during these shares and to capture each persons expectations. 

2. 1 Year Review 

Looking back at your 1 Year Target, we now allocate the time to look at the key measurables and goals that we said we would achieve at year-end against our true figures. 

1. Numbers 

Your Yearly Measurables should be prioritised in order of importance and now we go through number by number and cross-reference with our true number for the previous year. 

Take a pause here and as a team review how we feel about the true figures versus the predicted measurables. Are you thrilled? Did you miss calculate? 

Reviewing will help guide you for when you reset for next years measurables. 

2. Goals 

Did we achieve what we said we wanted to achieve in the past year? This is a ‘Done/ Not Done’ exercise and the aim is to get an 80% Completion rate. 

Got 80% – Celebrate! This is fantastic work!! 

Under 80% – Capture the missed goals and when we reset for the next year, think about how we can make them achievable. 

3. Quarter Review

1. Measurables 

Did we achieve what we predicted we would achieve?

2. Rocks

1. Done/ Not done (80%) – Part 1 of reviewing your rocks is simply a “Done/not Done” process with no extra discussion needed Go through each rock and decide whether it was ‘Done’ or ‘Not Done’ (fight the urge to jump into a discussion here). Count the amount of ‘Done’ Rocks as a percentage. The aim is to have at least 80% of the rocks complete. 
2. Issues list from Rocks – this is where we have an opportunity to air any issues or problems encountered with achieving the rocks that had been set. Notetaker captures the issues on the issue list for the day
3. Review the Quarter as a whole – What else happened this quarter that is noteworthy – ask questions here, we want the good and the bad to come out. Any issues that arise need to go on the list 

Grade your Year 

Quick Writing exercise – Give the team 30 secs to write down what they would grade the past year on a scale of 1 to 10. 1 Being the worst year in business they could have imagined, 10 being the most productive, goal smashing and fulfilling year they could have in business. 

Ask for a volunteer to share their number, and go clockwise around the room to hear each team members number. 

The point of this exercise is to understand whether the team has similar perceptions of how the year went.

Line in the sand

If it has been a great year, schedule a celebration day to recognise the achievements made! If it has been a terrible year, commit to making the next one much better. 

We draw a line in the sand here, it is time to start afresh – no more time looking back, this is the turning point of your meeting to only focus on the future.  A clean slate for the taking! 

Coffee Break 10 mins – everyone breaks at the same time and commits to being back in the room and ready to start at the agreed time. 

4. 5 Dysfunctions of a Team

Prior to your annual planning meeting, you would have got your team to read the 5 Dysfunctions of a team summary page (available on your Inner Circle membership portal) 

This segment is all about building the inner dynamic relations between the team and re-teaching the importance of a functional team.

Lencioni Triangle Teaching Points 

1. Explain the Lencioni Triangle
2. Talk about What a Functional Team Vs a Dysfunctional Team Do at each Level (Based on 5 Dysfunctions Review Document)  

Please refer to the CA Training Call or the Annual Planning Training call for further information

Team Exercise

Once everyone understands the difference between a functional and a dysfunctional team, the exercise is to:

1. Take a quiet writing moment to rate from 1-10 based on how they feel the leadership team functions 1 – Very Dysfunctional 10 – Super Functional. 
2. Starting with the bottom of the triangle (Trust) go round the room and each person shares the number they rated the leadership team. 
3. Write each number shared and divide by the number of people in the room – this gives you your average number per layer for your leadership team’s Triangle

If any of the layers average numbers sits below a 6, then the next segment of the day on trust builders will be critical for your team in the year ahead 😉 

Note – We do this as a leadership team exercise first as first of all, it is only fair to only rate the people in the room plus, being a functional cohesive team must come from the leaders for it to be shown across the team as a whole. 

Notetaker to capture any issues that arise during this exercise

5. Overview of Trust Builders

Sometimes the thought of doing trust builders can evoke cringing and hesitation, as people think of ‘Trust falls’ and forced fun. However, when described and introduced to the team correctly along with utilising the endless possibilities of different types of trust builders, they are key to building the foundational level of the Lencioni Triangle. 

Building Trust has a ripple effect on each other level and ultimately returns higher results at the top. It has been proven in a universal study that for every pound that you invest in team building, you actually get 23 back! 

Introduce the concept of trust builders through the explanation of Johari’s Window 

The Johari window model is used to enhance the individual’s perception of others. This model is based on two ideas- trust can be acquired by revealing information about you to others and learning more about yourself from their feedback. 

Each person is represented by the Johari model through four quadrants or window pane. Each four window panes signifies personal information, feelings, motivation and whether that information is known or unknown to oneself or others in four viewpoints.

The aim of trust builders and the examples of trust builders we recommend below is to help your team open up their ‘Open Self’ Viewpoints by learning more about each other so that we can increase the amount of information known to others and known to self. 

So every quarter we like to add in some kind of trust builder, here are the examples of trust builders that work well: 

• Summer Socials 
• Christmas Drinks/ Parties
• Personal Histories 
• DISC Profiling 
• 16 Personalities
• Myers Briggs
• Experience Days e.g. Go-karting, Axe Throwing, Obstacle Courses 

Basically, any opportunity where you can be together as a collective and not just focused on work is hugely beneficial 

Choose the date for the next quarter’s trust builder and agreed upon in the room. 

6. SWOT Analysis

Writing Exercise – On a Piece of paper analyse your practice based on a SWOT Analysis then each person share their views. This may help spark an idea for the year ahead and also identify any other issues within the business which different departments may not be aware of. 

7. Business Focussed Check-Up 

1. Using the printed version, pass out one per person at the meeting, of  ‘Ryan’s 11 Foundational Rules of a Business Focussed Practice’ (available as a download under the Annual Planning Training Call in the Inner Circle Members area and attached in the email after the call held on Wednesday 22nd December 2022) 

2. Quiet reflection – each team circles the answers to the questions on a scale of 1 -10 1 being – we NEVER do this to 10 being we DEFINITELY do this. We want honest answers here – if it’s a 2 – mark it a 2! Share with your team the importance of true reflection.

3. Add up the scores. Now there are 11 questions and the score is from zero to 10. So the highest score that you could potentially get for this exercise is 110.  As always. We’re trying to achieve  80% across the business cause no business is perfect. So 88 is the ideal. ( Important sidebar – it’s totally ok if the scores are lower than 88 – this task is to identify where we can improve in the year ahead 😉 ) 

4. Group Share your Scores – just the number – no further discussion needed – this is about awareness. 

5. Now ask your team to relook at their answers and circle where they may have identified the issues for business and capture these issues onto their dedicated note pages for issues. 

8. Issue Collation 

We love issues! 

BIG Issue list = HEALTHY team and business! Celebrate your issue list! 

I encourage you to get as many issues out during these days as we can. Why? Because when we shine a light on an issue, it shrinks back. If we let it fester in the dark, it’s going to grow into a massive mushroom big issues.

Throughout your annual planning meeting so far everyone should have been compiling their own issue lists for the business.  

Allocate the team member with the neatest (and fastest) handwriting to start writing up the captured issues. 

I suggest for this a rather large whiteboard or sticking up multiple pages of flipchart paper ( another great reason for taking this meeting off-site – the last thing we need is for a client to appear whilst we are deep-diving into the business issues) 

Important – As the day goes on, we are not discussing our issues, just capturing them. It’s like, okay, add core values to the issue list. Cool, added. And we move on. 

Let’s shine the light on the issues. Let’s make this a safe space for us to collate all of the issues so that we can work on them during our Pinpoint, Brainstorm, Solve, To-do’s (P B S T) segment later on in the day.

Lunch in house (45 Min) Lunch is to be eaten together and make it fun! We love getting take out like Nando’s for our days 

9. Build New Vision Reality Document 

10. 3 Year Picture 

Break

11. 1 Year Picture

12. 90 Day Plan

13. Issues – PBST 

For Breakdown on Items 9 through to 13 please refer to my “Tips for smooth Quarterlies” article or the Q+A Call Number 93 in your Members Area on your Inner Circle Members Portal 

14. Feedback 

You made it ! To round off the day we like to conclude and hear back from our team how they felt the day has been. This is a quiet written exercise followed by a group share and the questions we are answering are: 

•Where is your head at?

•How are you feeling?

•Where your expectations met?

•How to you rate today’s annual on a scale of 1-10? 

Post Quarterly Work 

• Recap To-Do List – make sure the to-do’s are to-done in the next 7 days.
• Update your tools with the new Information
  • Vision Reality Document 
  • Issues List
  • Organisational Chart
  • Scorecard 

• Schedule your first action on your Rocks within 48hrs.
• Send out the diary placeholder for the next quarterly 
• Share your Annual Planning Meeting wins on our Inner Circle Facebook Group!