Intentional Leaders Podcast with Cyndi Wentland

Why Your OKRs Disappear by Week 3 — And the Leadership Rituals That Keep Teams Focused

• Cyndi

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Strategy doesn’t fail for lack of ideas—it fails at the handoff to execution. We bring in OKR expert and Wave Nine founder Philip Schett to show how to close that gap with clear goals, shared rituals, and a culture that trades micromanagement for ownership. Philip’s journey from Germany to Silicon Valley reframed his thinking: great companies don’t win because they dream better; they win because they execute better. That mindset shift powers the conversation as we dig into OKRs done right—less about perfect wording, more about changing team behavior, building trust through transparency, and making alignment a weekly practice.

We unpack the patterns behind “set and forget” goals, and why town halls and slide decks rarely produce real alignment. Philip introduces three simple rituals that compound: Monday calibrate to focus on outcomes for the week, Friday celebrate to make progress visible and energizing, and quarterly resets to protect priorities without hiding behind annual vagueness. We explore accountability with a human tone—say what you’ll do, do what you said—using one-on-ones for tough conversations and public forums for recognition. You’ll hear how co-creating OKRs prevents dehumanizing top-down mandates, why OKR champions are key to scaling across functions, and how nonprofits can turn passion into measurable impact with the same playbook.

If you’ve ever watched goals vanish by week three, wrestled with cross-functional friction, or confused motion with progress, this episode offers a practical operating system: verify understanding instead of assuming it, make work visible to accelerate trust, and anchor execution in rhythms your team can keep. Subscribe, share this with a leader who needs clearer focus, and leave a review telling us which ritual you’ll start this week.

Get in Touch with Phillip Schett:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/philipp-schett/



#OKRs #LeadershipExecution #BuildTrust #TeamAlignment #MondayCalibrate #LeadershipPodcast #ExecutionCulture

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SPEAKER_01:

Welcome to the Intentional Leaders Podcast. I'm your host, Cindy Wetland. And today I am interviewing a very fascinating guest. His name is Philip Schett. He is managing a company, a consulting company based in both Berlin and San Francisco. And he is an OKR expert. Now, when I first heard that, I thought, what is an OKR expert? What does that mean? But it is about objectives and business results that organizations want and need. So if you are in an organization, if you're in a leadership role and you have a clear strategy, you have clear results and objectives that you want to accomplish, but you're not getting there. Phillips' organization helps to align companies to achieve their goals. And originally, when I first saw his podcast application and we met, and I thought, uh, I don't know. It what is this going to be, um, is this going to be focused on the people part of results and results generation, or is this going to be based on the infrastructure part or how to create a goal or anything like that? I was very intrigued by what it was. And when I discovered what Philips organization does, I was fascinating because if you have a strategy and you're not achieving your goals or your strategy in execution, and there's something happening that is getting in the way, it's very common. So he really bakes in collaboration, um, co-creation, accountability, and trust into the work he does. And once I truly understood how they create that infrastructure and what it looks like in practice, I was very intrigued. And I know you will be too. So welcome to the podcast interview and let's hear what Philip has to say. All right. Today I am thrilled to welcome Philip Schett to our Intentional Leaders podcast.

SPEAKER_03:

Thank you so much for having me.

SPEAKER_01:

So you um your organization is called Wave Nine, and you were inspired uh to create this organization and shape this vision through your experience, uh, for example, at T-Mobile and at Meta. So, what prompted you to want to go off on your own and to create this organization and the focus of your organization?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, thank you. Yeah, you you hear my accent, right? And probably every every listener and every viewer uh is recognizing it quickly too. I'm originally German, but I moved to Silicon Valley in 2014. And you know, I moved to Silicon Valley because I thought, well, these companies are doing great, these organizations are doing great. I really want to be part of that ecosystem. And I thought, hey, it must be the ideas that they're having, that they are great, and that that those are well, maybe maybe smarter ideas, maybe more creative, maybe more innovative. And and then I was originally sent there by T Mobile as an innovation consultant. So my my role was to well explore explore ideas there. And and I quickly realized that I mean there's a saying an idea is a dime a dozen, uh, ideas are a dime a dozen. And and really I found that out myself. So it wasn't it wasn't that the ideas were so much different, but it was the ability to execute of those organizations that was vastly different than in Germany, well, or in Europe in generally. In Germany, we we might have had 15 alignment meetings and 15 conversations, and then in in the US, well, things got done. And so, and you know, that that's of course a bit of an oversimplification, but I really found that there's a there's a material difference there in terms of how organizations are driving with velocity, are driving with urgency, and and a strong bias to action. And then I found that that ability to execute isn't just it's not like it's not a gift from God. It's it's it's it's a process and it's uh it's based in methodologies and it's based in well, common understanding of of organizations of how to drive a system like that. And so and that's how I discovered OKRs, objectives and key results, as as one of the methodologies that we we introduced at clients. And I met Devnet, the founder of Workboard, of one of the leading OKR platforms. And she was one of the people that I met which who had uh a huge impact on on me personally, but also a huge impact on me professionally, because she she is really driving with a lot of urgency and a lot of energy. And I I saw that she's onto something and she was she was teaching me on about OKRs, and then and then one thing led to the other. And eventually we we decided that yeah, we want to do this ourselves, and we want to do this just focused on OKRs. At meta at Microsoft and Meta or at Meta, at T Mobile, I was still doing many other things as well, which isn't normal in a in a corporate world, right? You do you wear many hats. And I wanted to really only focus on this one thing and become really good at it.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, it it's so interesting because when you say, you know, I I went from uh Germany to the States, you know, to Silicon Valley. And of course, my heritage is German. And I think, hey, Germans, we are known for being efficient and effective for doing things in a disciplined way.

SPEAKER_02:

So my heritage is a little bit like, oh, how do we not know how to do that as a people?

SPEAKER_03:

You know, I I like to now say that I I combine German precision with American speed and American optimism, American energy. And I like to combine those those two, right? You you you can benefit from both.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes, yes. Doesn't okay. That makes my heart feel better. All right. So when you look at this whole OKR um focus for you, what what was your aha moment where you thought this has to be more hands-on? Like people have to learn how to do this in a more um practical way, in a more hands-on way, in a more scalable way. And what really led you to understand that?

SPEAKER_03:

You know, there were there were several aha moments, honestly, and and and I probably still have have those aha moments that lead to improvements in our program every every now and then. But you know, the first one was was when I when I discovered that organizations were going through the the motions of implementing OKRs. But weren't sorry uh for the little visual here. Um they were going through the motions of implementing OKRs, but they weren't seeing the benefits. So organizations were seeing OKRs somewhere and were trying to basically take it as a almost as a from a recipe book, implementing the motions and implementing OKRs, but not really changing anything in the organization, not really seeing benefits in the organization. And you know that that's painful because you you have all the pain of changing something and of learning something new, but you don't really see the benefit. And that's when I when I realized, okay, it's not it's not about being dogmatic about OKRs, it's not about the syntax or how you write your goals, it is about some underlying principles. And those underlying principles were relatively poorly under understood and therefore very often poorly implemented. And so that's that's really how we how we got started as an as an organization. Not not trying to teach people how to write their goals better, right? But but trying to well help them execute against those goals better. And to make sure that those goals aren't like just there for goals' sake, but are actually changing behaviors in an organization. And so that was an aha moment. And you know, the second, the second big aha moment that we need a bit more scalable and more hands-on approach was it was 2017, 2018, 2019 before COVID. Um, when I was like I was flying, I was uh uh premier at Southwest and and at the same time, uh like I was a Premier 1K at uh at United and uh and uh um and uh also a premier at Southwest. And and at the same time I was flying like 200 times a year. It was it was insane, but it was also a lot of fun, right? I had a at the time of my life because I was flying to Philadelphia next day to taking a train to New York, then flying up to Chicago, and then back to LA and and then to San Francisco, and it was it was a lot of fun. And we did all those workshops with with leadership teams implementing OKRs. And and then we we were pretty much focused on implementing OKRs at a leadership level. Because honestly, that's that's when it makes sense to fly in a consultant right from far away and follow the leadership team, and that's when you yeah, when and it typically makes sense to have those resources. But I I then called up my clients when I was back in San Francisco, typically after like five or six weeks. I was back in San Francisco for a couple of weeks, and then I was calling and hey Peter, Peter, Peter was in Philadelphia, how are you doing? And hey, I'm doing fine, the organization is doing well, and but you know, and how are the OKRs doing that we we've said, yeah, you know, could you come back in a few weeks? Because I think we need to set new OKRs because we have already forgotten about the the OKRs that we have set, and that became super painful, right? You you spend your your time and obviously they spend money on something that doesn't really change anything because it is set and forget. And so we had beautiful OKRs created, but we didn't put them into action. And so we really figured out that it's not like the work with the leadership team is fun. I love that. And it's it's good energy, it's it's typically nice dinners afterwards, it's it's nice, it's good travel. And but then afterwards, if you don't localize it to the rest of the organization, that you if you don't make it something that's meaningful for the rest of the organization, then if you don't scale it, then it becomes it becomes a set and forget exercise. And so yeah, we really knew that we can't really realistically set OKRs with 50, 100, 500 teams of an organization. Um and so we had to create a scaled, a scaled approach.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, that's a really um I love the the insights you have about, and I think about that from myself um from a learning or training perspective. When I come in to do something and it's an event, and I come in and I do the thing, or I do several things and then leave, and then a year later, like, oh hey, we need that again, or oh, what did we do? Or it and there isn't sustainability to it, it's a really frustrating thing, right? Because as you said, you you understand what are those gaps, you help try to fill them. And then when it isn't um sustainable and it isn't implemented or it isn't doesn't become part of the fabric of the organization, it's frustrating. And and as you think about that from a leadership perspective, because folks that are listening to this podcast are in those leadership roles. What do you think is the biggest obstacle to them cascading those measurable objectives, those key results? What do you think is getting in the way of their ability to do that?

SPEAKER_03:

Uh often it's not all no at first, it's not really the ability, it's the decision. All right. So you have to you have to want to do it. So and so leadership teams often don't do it because they they assume alignment. So they assume that once we present the leadership OKRs to the rest of the organization, once we discuss the new strategy PowerPoint at a at a town hall meeting, that everyone will understand it and every every function will know what to do. But in reality, we all know that that's not necessarily the case. You you have your you have your annual town hall, and and honestly, like I've been I've been part of those for very long. And and then and you you want to listen to the CEO and their strategy presentation, and the CEO and the chief strategy officer, but well, it's it's Friday, it's 5 p.m. and and all you want is that barbecue outside and maybe a fresh beverage, and I don't need anyone. So you you you have to understand that that's just not enough to create alignment. But yeah, again, often it's assumed alignment, but then when you want to do it, then it's often that the the in-house capabilities are are a bit lacking because you who who is going to lead such an effort, right? It is every function is all already really, really busy. And yeah, there is there are very few people that you know in modern organizations that are working cross-functionally. So marketing is working in marketing, sales is working in sales, but to really do that alignment, you need someone that that works cross-functionally. So, chief of staff, that role has become more popular, especially in the US, but it also become more popular in in Europe, and that is a role that can now lead lead such an effort and is really uh really in a good position typically because they are they are by nature cross-functional. And so, but very often organizations don't have someone like that or or don't know how to scale it themselves. Because if you have one chief of staff or a 500 people organization, they are they have the same problem that we would have, they can't do all those workshops. So you you basically need an approach that yeah that scales that and and typically we work with okay our champions across the organization. So we train people in it's a trainer uh it's a train the trainer approach almost. Yes, it is excellent. We we work with with those and then they they teach others, and so it's yeah, it's it's things like that that that are required that yeah, many organizations don't have.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, oh I love that explanation. And I think you you're right, there are one, a lot of assumptions made that when we communicate something, everyone's like gonna one understand it to well, to be one, be paying attention, as you said, being fully present, understanding it, absorbing it, two, know what to do with it. Um, and then three, when they run into an obstacle, as you said, a lot of organizations that I'm working with, um, I focus a lot on collaboration and teaching a class about that this afternoon, how to collaborate and that cross-functional collaboration. I think people have to learn how to do that as a practice, and leaders have to lead the ability to do that. And there's a lot of skills and practices that help to foster that, but we don't just know how to do it. So I think, as you said, you know, how do we increase the in-house capability to lead that kind of change, to lead that kind of collaboration around a specific set of goals or objectives is important. And I I definitely see those disconnects.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. And you know, I still, after 10 years, love doing what I'm doing, uh, even though of course it sometimes becomes repetitive, and sometimes you you you're doing an a thing that well, you I'm always like nowadays, I don't travel as I don't love to travel as much anymore as I as I used to, but but I still do it, but I still love what I'm what I'm doing and what we are doing for and one of the main reasons for that is that the transparency that OKRs bring, right? Everyone sees everyone else's OKRs and every other team, and then you're setting sometimes OKRs together, and that really is an accelerator for trust. Yeah, because if you like, where does mistrust come from? It typically comes from not understanding each other and often not communicating with each other. So then that happens in relationships, that happens in society, that happens in organizations. And so if if I see which goals you're working toward and if and what what's working well and what's maybe your where where you're struggling, uh it it is it is an accelerate for trust, it is a it is a often a prerequisite for trust. And I think that's something that I that I love about our work.

SPEAKER_01:

Sure. Yeah. Well, and um in the uh the work I do around collaboration and conflict alignment of goals is one of six conflicts that I frequently talk about in in organizations that, okay, I'm in marketing, I'm supposed to be selling and marketing, and over here I'm on the operational side and I have to execute and I can't do it because you're bringing too much or whatever that is, creating that conflict because we don't have a shared goal or a shared vision of what we're supposed to be doing together. So I think you're, you know, that is so significant. And as you said, tying it back to trust that we see what we're all working towards and we can move towards it. Because when you and I talked initially, one of the things we talked about is trust and accountability. And part of that, to me, almost like on the surface, you could think of teamwork and collaboration isn't about goals and measures. Like that takes the humanness out of it. But from your perspective, you're saying that interjects the humanness into the framework because now we're clear on where we're going together. And that is going to create that trust. So it's almost, does does that make sense? It's it was squishy in my head because I thought, you know, I understand the importance of goals and understanding results, but then when does that become less human? You know what I mean? Or am I babbling?

SPEAKER_03:

No, no, no, you're not. And and honestly, there's a risk of any goal setting methodology, okay or KPIs, or any any goal setting methodology can be misused. And we have we have worked with CEOs and leadership teams where we had to stop the partnership because they were misusing and they were really dehumanizing the approach, and they were misusing the tool. It can happen because if you are let me give you the example. We I was flying to rural Illinois, like 45 minutes west of west of Chicago. Um, it was an organization, and we our approach of well, setting goals requires the people that those goals are for are participating in the process. So you're not setting goals for someone. Uh it it sounds almost ridiculous, right? But yeah, in many organizations, goals are still set for people, and that can be easily dehumanizing. So we were we were traveling through that organization, and the leadership team of seven, and you can roughly imagine how diverse that leadership group was, was asking me to basically write down OKRs with them for 300 people. And and basically at the end of the the weekend, we were supposed to have like every one of the organizations, everyone's goals, and that is not an so I mean I give it to them that it's a very efficient approach, like it's very less time consuming. So, but you really don't get what I what I would say OKRs should do, and that is they should create clarity on the other side side. So, really, okay, I need to understand what I'm accountable for, I need to understand what you want me to do, but also I need to I need to be, I need to take ownership, and I can really only take ownership and accountability if I'm being part of that process and if I'm being being part of my own goal setting. And so, yeah, we we couldn't, we couldn't really that was one of the weirdest weekends of my of my life, honestly, because I I I basically had to walk out and give the money back because it was it was yeah, it was not something that I was comfortable doing and putting our our brand behind and our my name. And so again, it's it's goal setting has risks, absolutely, and has pitfalls and can be misused. Um but being used right, I think it can be it can be unified, it can be it can be create a lot of clarity, and it can also create a lot of freedom because if you're if you're working without goals then or without metrics, you you and and then it becomes busy or then then it doesn't work as you want. Leaders that I've worked with often tend to micromanage and then they they manage on a task level. Yes. And that that's that's dangerous itself, right? As well. And so you you are introducing goals so that I trust you to deliver on that outcome and not so that I don't have to micromanage you on the way on the way to get there.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, and that's a really awesome insight. And also I think it is so important because you know, when you and I first talked, you talked about that collaborative process and that co-creation. We have to create things together. And if we create things together and it's transparent and we're aligned, it creates that accountability. And if there's accountability, I am trusting someone to do what they need to do. I'm not micromanaging them, I'm not getting involved in their stuff. And I think a lot of managers get involved in people's tasks and stuff because that's what they've done, or that's how they were managed. And so now what are we supposed to be doing differently? But then they're so frustrated because they can't hold people accountable to the results, but they're micromanaging the tasks. So, how you know, so when you when you think about accountability, because I think this is also uh again, I think collaboration is one thing we're not really taught how to do. And by design, you are helping people to practice collaboration through your approach. And then secondly, I don't think we're taught how to hold how to create an account accountable culture. And so tell me some of your thoughts on that and what you see in terms of best practices or pitfalls with accountability.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Accountability often has a has almost a bad reputation because you you think about it as something that's where I don't know, I hold your feet to the fire. I I hear that sentence a lot, right? And that that's already that already has a negative negative connotation. I like to describe accountability more as I define it as we have a culture where we all say what we do, right? I I say clearly, I will do this, and I am I am responsible for this. I am or we are responsible for this as a team. And then we do what we say. So and that and that culture is that has accountability. Now I like to model that almost from a like a sports team. Let's imagine a soccer team, right? It is clear that I am that I have this position in a in in the organization. I'm a defender, I play midfield, uh I'm offensive, but but that doesn't mean that I'm just playing offense, right? That also means, yes, I'm accountable for scoring goals, but I have to run bad sometimes. And so that's the culture that we want to yeah, we want to deduce as a in an in an organization. And that requires trust again. Uh I mean, trust really is without trust, it is this is extremely, extremely difficult because it requires us to have and learn learn conversations and so and learn learn hard conversations. And the way the way we we try and move organizations along that curve is we start easy. So we even start positive. So in a in a weekly, in a weekly team meeting, typically on Fridays, that is something that we call uh celebrate, Friday celebrate. So we call it Monday calibr calibrate when we talk about okay, what do we want to achieve this week? What do we want to what needs to be done? And then Friday we celebrate. And so and I mean every everyone knows that you have to you can't start with eight, nine, or ten out of ten uh uh constructive feedback or negative, negative words. So you have to start really building up the positive reinforcement, and that's what we we in well what we do in the Friday, Friday celebrate. And so really we're trying to have to build up to be able to have negative and then honest constructive conversations, we build a foundational layer of positive conversations.

SPEAKER_04:

Yay!

SPEAKER_03:

It is counterintuitive, maybe, but it is often required because otherwise, like if you if you start having these hard conversations in your organization without that layer, like you you destroy trust and you destroy the ability to collaborate and and I and the ability to often take accountability. So we take that positive layer and then we work with with managers to then start having those arder conversations in their one-on-ones. So yeah, worst case, and I've seen it too often, is you have a you have a leader calling out someone in a in a team meeting and giving them and and giving them a hard time or holding their feet to the fire in public.

SPEAKER_01:

Embarrassing them, shaming them.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, and that and surprisingly, that's not really helpful, right?

unknown:

I know.

SPEAKER_03:

And and you know, it's yeah, that's that's um that's again, that's a little little step to uh having yeah, uh introducing a culture of culture of accountability.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, we think that's I I just love the way you're describing the work that you do, Phil. Because when I first saw, like, here's your company, here's what you do, I'm like, okay, goals and results. Like, okay, that sounds really fun. And then, but I didn't get it that you're not really like helping people just to develop the goals, the and the the key results that they want. You're helping them create a culture and an infrastructure to for alignment, for collaboration, for accountability, and so many of those very elusive practices that I think again, we aren't taught to do. We're expected to do them, like we're expected to collaborate and co-create and do all these things and trust each other. But without the practices and without the practical knowledge or capability to do that and the confidence to do it and do it well, there's lots of um gaps.

SPEAKER_03:

I I I agree. And and I if and it it starts early, right? Okay, this is probably a bit outside of of our topic area, but even we never we have never learned this, right? It's in school or in university. I've learned biology and And history and and then algebra, oh of those things, right? Then I did my MBA and still yeah, I still haven't learned how to have have a conversation, a hard conversation, without getting emotional. Right? So it's and and honestly, it isn't something that I yeah, it is definitely something that I I had to learn. And then I when I became a manager for the first time at at Deutsch Telekom or at T Mobile, it was I had no training. Like and then they were throwing in these young people and made me responsible for for their performance. And and I had to learn, I had to learn through hard, hard work how to behave as a good as a good manager. And luckily I had fantastic, fantastic people um back then, but yeah, it was it was not something that I felt well well prepared for. So yeah, you're completely right. It's not something that we that we take for granted. And it is something that if if you look at organizational budgets, right, we spend 99.9% into the stuff, and then 0.1% or so into how do we actually collaborate, how do we work, and that is very very often, it's another it's another reason for silos. Very often it's that it's it's up to the manager to manage their team, right? And then therefore, everyone does it a tiny bit different, and there isn't really a shared language, there isn't really a shared uh shared rituals, and so that makes collaboration even even more difficult across those those functions if you if you manage differently.

SPEAKER_01:

You bet. So when you think about the leadership, it well, all right, let me let me back up here. What when you think of organizations that want to come and work with you and say, oh, we have a need or gap, what is the biggest issue that you hear in people reaching out to you to say they need help? What would that sound like? What's what's the biggest thing?

SPEAKER_03:

So most often there's a there's a leader in an organization that has a new a new strategy. And so they are excited about that. They're excited about that strategy, and they somewhat are not seeing that that the organization they are getting frustrated by the organization uh not not picking up their priorities or working on working on the wrong stuff, they have too many were too many projects in yeah, in progress, right? They and therefore they don't deliver on on their yeah, on their aspirations. And so there's often that that gap. And so yeah, we we often get contacted by leaders being frustrated by that.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay.

SPEAKER_03:

That's of course. And and often enough it's it's some of the the habits and the things that the leader is doing. But again, that that's how organizations very often get in get in touch with us because there's a there's a gap between yeah, there's a gap between the the aspiration and and the reality in the organization. It's often it's often honestly frustrating to work in in organizations like that because they they have not, yeah, they they have a growth drag, right? They they don't they are having a hard time and and very often or or they are growing, but then sometimes they are they are outgrowing their their management systems. So they are they need to install more more mature systems. So it varies a bit, but yeah, there are there's some some of those common themes.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, okay. And you you mentioned to me previously that it could be um people that are um stuck in their ways around you know those practices, or they're not um and and I think some of that they're not able to, I guess, uh cascade the strategy, understand how to do that, how to create the kind of environment that will foster the execution of the strategy. Well, and the understanding and the embracing of it, and then what am I supposed to do with this? So I think that's really cool. The work you're doing, and it's you you mentioned to me that about a third of the clients that you serve are nonprof nonprofit organizations, is that correct?

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, yes, and I would love if that that share even grows because it's something you know, I've I've just the the challenges of nonprofits is something that I think we're really well positioned to to solve. And I love working with those nonprofits because they are often uh well working on great missions, they are really helping to improve society, and very often those causes are are something that I yeah, that I'm very, very interested in. And so very often they they have a lot of energy, they have a lot of passion, and they don't necessarily have the mature management models and mature leadership models to to really make sure that every every bit of resource is being spent and every bit of dollar is spent in the right, yeah, in the right way.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's a it's probably probably incredibly rewarding to see that. When you when you're passionate about that mission and you know that this organization is created to make an impact and they're not. And and that passion and energy can create a lot of low morale, like, okay, we're not we're not making a difference here, we're not doing the things we want, or that level of frustration is probably very emotional because people are very passionate or they wouldn't be doing the work that they're doing. So to be able to help them to understand how to create that and give them the the tools and the practices has got to be really rewarding, I would think. It is, yes. So when you think about you stepping back and thinking about your leadership, you've had a really amazing career, you've started this global organization. What are some of the things, your leadership practices that help you stay aligned, stay effective personally while leading a global consultancy organization?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I think it's it's three main things. So the the most important piece is probably a weekly team meeting. And and that sounds very, very basic and very fundamental, but I know I'm always surprised that leaders tell me, Oh, yeah, um we have a monthly leadership team meeting. And I'm like, how do you like you no no surprise you're misaligned? The the stuff that happens in one month, that's a very long time to not see each other and not meet. So we have a weekly, yeah, a weekly team meeting. It's typically Monday, Monday morning, San Francisco time, and then and then that really helps us to make sure that everyone is energized, but also everyone is absolutely clear on this is what we what do we want to do, what do we want to do this week.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Then I think the the second key thing is uh are those quarterly quarterly resets. So every quarter we're we're taking the time to set new yeah, new OKRs. And yeah, and just make sure that we are still on track and on course and and prioritize. And you know, the quarterly rhythm is something that that I also love. The transparency piece is something that I love. The quarterly rhythm is also something that I love because it is it is almost like I feel it's almost impossible to say, oh yeah, this is not a priority this year, right? If you're setting if you're setting goals, it's super difficult to say, yeah, no, let's not do let's not tackle this this year. We will get to it next year. That's so tough. But if you if you do it for a quarter, like okay, let's not do it in July, let's do it in September, right? That becomes more more feasible. And so that it's still it's still a long time, it's still not easy, but that that is a prerequisite very often for focus, and so that's why we do it in in quarterly, quarterly. And then the last one is it's like the weekly weekly celebration. It's it's important for our culture, it's important for our yeah, it's important for our our progress. And as as probably almost every entrepreneur, I live from momentum. If I if I see momentum, then hey, let's let's go. But and that that requires, or very often that requires us to celebrate the smaller, the smaller steps, because there isn't a big win every week, like not uh, but there is something to celebrate, and that creates momentum.

SPEAKER_01:

What does that look like, Philip, when you think about a celebration?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, a lot of people would think, okay, that's not you know, that's not worth our time or energy, or we can't afford that time or energy or whatever it might be. What does it look like for you?

SPEAKER_03:

It can be super small, like a like a message, like a Slack message in our shared channel or a video message, right? Or a little gift to to someone in the team, or hey, or uh in our if we have a team meeting on Friday, then we cheers to each other. It can be something really, really small, or calling out, call like shouting out to someone that did great work this week. So it's really it can be it can be little things and it doesn't necessarily need to cost money, right? Of course, yeah. Of course, if you want to invest, a fantastic place to invest. But it's really it's if you work for a company for some time, right? Then and then you're you're coming on Monday, and then you're leaving on Friday, and then no one ever recognizes the work that you're doing and and the yeah, the the results you're achieving, then that becomes sad, right? That becomes a sad place. So it's it's it's just something that doesn't require a ton uh of effort, but it is something that I would compare to brushing your teeth, right? If you if you brush your teeth only once a year, you can do it, you can do it for half an hour. It probably won't matter. So rather do it, rather do it very regularly. And so that's the same with recognition. Like you don't want to just recognize someone's someone's work and someone's achievements in February before bonus day. You want to achieve it, you want to recognize it much more frequently.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes, yes, that's fantastic. And I think what is so essential about what you just said, because a lot of people, it isn't for you, those meetings, like if I'm saying uh I meet once a month and that's fine. You know, why do I need to meet more? But you're not talking about the quantity of meetings and the frequency of meetings per se. You're talking about the quality of the meetings and what are discussed at the meetings. So it isn't just like let's meet weekly to meet weekly, and everyone hangs out like well, um, but you're very it's a very focused approach on you said clear and energized. So we're gonna be clear and energized for the week. And then at the end of the week, we're gonna focus on what we accomplished together. So there's not, it's not just about how often we meet or doing that, it's about what we're doing as an outcome of the meeting. And I think that's a really essential point.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, and I and I rather have a 15-minute meeting than and that every week just to make sure, okay, there's an agenda, there are a couple of items prepared, and we can do a lot of that work async as well. But at least we we we are clear, and everyone and everyone says they are clear, right? It's not again, it's not assumed that everyone's clear, but I get a thumbs up, okay. Everyone's clear what the priority is for this this week, and so that's that's important. And yes, you um the devil is in a detail again if you don't like I I know organizations that meet every week for like three or four hours in a team meeting. And that's of course, you don't you're not energized afterwards, you're like okay, that was that was 10% of my work time this week, and I somewhat still still need to get work done. So yeah, you do do it short, crisp, yes, and and high energy.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I love that. And um and by doing that, again, I just want to call this out because I think you're doing this by through how you're meeting with people and what you're meeting with people about, is you're baking in accountability because accountability is not just I didn't get something done, but it's what I did get done and celebrating those results, celebrating the wins. And I think that's why accountability is such a bad rap because we associate it with the things we didn't do as opposed to what did we do. And that is accountability. It's what I'm answerable to both, and we get to celebrate both. And that feels good. And I it's it's just being baked into our week and our culture and how we interact. And I think that's pretty cool. Yeah, I love that. All right, so my last question to you is really about um advice giving. And I know as consultants, we don't always like to tell people advice, you know, to help them find it within themselves. But for the purposes of this, if you think about navigate navigating those executional challenges that probably everybody's experiencing these days because change is happening so rapidly, um, business practices, it it's it's just tough, right, to lead right now. So, what would be um a piece of advice you would give to leaders right now who are navigating those executional challenges? What would you tell them?

SPEAKER_03:

Don't assume generally, don't don't assume that you're good at this, don't assume that your team understands everything. Don't understand that or don't don't assume that movement and busyness is actual progress. Right? So that that's that's an assumption many many have, and that that's often wrong. Don't assume that someone who is engaged in a in a team meeting completely understands it, right? Uh verify, assume but verify, and that doesn't mean that you you micromanage, it rather assumes it rather says uh means that you ask some some questions and that you know the it might be military convers uh communication style, but hey, I say this and then you repeat it, and then I repeat it because we we make sure that we understood each other, right? That's yes, that's again, that's not assuming that you understood it, but that's verifying that you understood it. And so that's that's my general execution advice. Don't assume, don't assume that there just because there's movement, that there's progress, just don't assume that just because everyone's smiling, that there's actual energy and that there's actual clarity. And so those are those are just some of the assumptions that that can be dangerous.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, absolutely. Well, I appreciate you sharing that because I'm sure you've seen a lot of the pitfalls that again are preventing people from achieving the results and the goals and the vision and the culture that they want. So uh this has just been a delight. I I appreciate you taking time out of your schedule to have this conversation, the second con second round of conversation with me to really understand what you're doing, but to help the audience understand how you can help organizations. So, what I'm hearing is people, you know, again, you're not focused on how to create the objectives, how to create the results. You're helping organizations, yes, do that well, but it's really about the execution of it. It's about the culture, it's about collaboration, it's about accountability, it's about trust, and it's about creating the management practices to ensure that you're reaching those goals.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, 100%. 100%. And and you know, you never like because setting goals is obviously easy, right? You never, when when when it becomes hard, you never rise to your goals. You fall down to yeah, your systems and your training and your and the and your ability to collaborate as an organization.

SPEAKER_01:

I love that. All right. Well, thank you again for this, uh, all the insights that you've shared today and all of the management practices that you've seen work and not work. So, what I love about what you're doing is you get to see both sides of it. You get to see all the pitfalls of people who want to execute a strategy and a culture, and then you've seen it come to life and how rewarding that must be. So the compare and contrast is probably ongoingly very energizing, I would imagine. It's pretty cool. Well, thank you again. I will put in the show notes a link to your LinkedIn profile, to your website so people can get in touch with you. Um, and again, I appreciate your time so much today, Philip.

SPEAKER_03:

Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_01:

I don't know about you, but I found that interview very fascinating. And here's why. I got so many requests to help train on conflict, difficult conversations, um, you know, helping managers to focus on higher level strategy or cross-functional teams, leading cross-functional teams. All of the things that organizations are struggling with that I hear from a training perspective is part of what Philips Organization does to tie and connect and cascade goals and results and objectives to the practices that bring it all together. So there's consulting around that to create the kind of organization that most of us want and desire. But there may be things that are getting in the way of us achieving those results. And that's what I love about the work he does. I see it very aligned with what I see in organizations in terms of where they're getting stuck. So please reach out with any questions or comments you have about this podcast, about the podcast interview, and check out the resources that Philip has on his website and get to know him on his LinkedIn profile because I bet he can add some value or insights to the work that you're doing, how you're leading and achieving those results intentionally.