Done or Not Done: How to Hold Your Team Accountable

The most expensive status update in your business is "on track."

It sounds like progress. It lets a project sit open for months without anyone finishing it, and it lets you believe your quarter went better than it did.

The status update I stopped accepting

I run quarterly planning with owners and their teams. A lot of teams will say to me, oh, it's on track.

So I stopped accepting it. A project is either done or it's not done. There is no third option.

Then we count. If a team had 10 projects and only got 5 of them done, that's 50% project completion. The goal is always 80%.

That number does something "on track" never will. Nobody can argue with it.

It also changes the meeting. When the only two answers are done and not done, people stop reporting how they feel about a project and start reporting what happened to it.

Last week, on a call with a group of business owners I work with, one of them brought up a project he had owned three quarters ago and asked the room where it was. Nobody knew. His own verdict: if nobody knows where it is, it's not working.

How to hold your team accountable for quarterly goals

Start with a shorter list. Write out what you think this quarter's projects are, then cut the list in half. You can be more fully committed to fewer things.

Give every project one owner. One name next to each project, not a department and not two names. When two people are accountable, nobody's accountable.

At the end of the quarter, mark each project done or not done. No partial credit, no "mostly there." Divide the done projects by the total and you have your completion rate. Aim for 80%. Keep the score from every quarter so you can see whether it is moving.

If you land well under that, look at the list before you look at the people. Too many projects and shared ownership will sink a good team every time.

And if every project on that list still needs you to move it forward, you have a delegation problem on top of a planning one. That's the work I do with owners one on one in The Handoff.

What to do this week

Pull up last quarter's project list and score it, done or not done, nothing in between.

Quick answers

What is a good project completion rate for a small business team?

Aim for 80% of the quarter's projects fully done. If your team set 10 projects and finished 5, your completion rate is 50%.

Why is "on track" a bad status update?

It describes a feeling, not a result, so a project can stay on track for months without ever finishing. Asking whether it is done or not done gives you a number you can measure.

How many quarterly projects should my team take on?

Fewer than you think. Write out your list, cut it in half, and give each project a single owner.

Sara Ritchie is a fractional COO who has worked in operations since 2007 and has coached more than 100 dental practices. She teaches women business owners to use Claude inside their real businesses through From Curious to Confident and works one on one with owners in The Handoff. More about Sara.