5 Ways to Make Your Workload Meetings Efficient & Engaging

As you may know, the Seven Keys to INNERGY Success model includes Engaged Ownership, a Strong Champion, Setting Implementation Milestones, Education, the Kotter Change Model, Using the Software, and Workload Meetings. The final key is what we’re focusing on here, as there are many ways to implement and ensure a successful Workload Meeting. From the inside, here are our 5 best practices for streamlining this element and making the most of this essential process.

Make it Recurring

Because the Workload Meeting is so important, it’s best to schedule the Workload Meeting for the same day each week, and at the same time. This allows everyone involved to put it on their calendars in stone, and work around it each week. It is crucial to make this process a habit, and leverage it to its fullest potential with consistency.

Plan Ahead

What good is a weekly meeting if nobody is prepared for it? We recommend putting together a brief meeting agenda the week prior, and sending to all involved so they can come knowing what the talking points are and ensure any action items are accounted for.

Include the Right People

While this is different for every organization, it’s smart to have the right people in your meeting. Not too many, but also not too little. If you’re missing key people, your team will need to take additional time to fill them in, so why not get everyone in the same room (or Zoom) at once? We often see Project Managers, the Engineering Team Lead, Sales & Estimating Crews, and Plant Managers involved in the most efficient Workload Meetings. Shop Foremen often run this meeting, but as long as it’s the same key people each time, the meeting will flow well.

Make Use of Your INNERGY Tools

During the meeting, build in time to review the Bottleneck Report (both Workflow and PM in Workflow), Work Order Grid (setup custom views prior to the meeting for efficiency), Forecaster (to show what might be coming in the door), Labor Kanban, and more.    

Take Action

Turn your time into success. If you have identified key projects that need additional support or bottleneck attention, assign a team member to put the solution in place by a specific agreed-upon deadline. The results of the meeting should give you a better handle on what to expect for the week and the immediate future so that you can adjust your production schedule proactively.

For more tips on best workflow practices, look to the INNERGY team! We have a wealth of information available to our customers via blogs like this, tutorials and videos, and our exclusive peAk education portal. Interested? Reach out to your INNERGY rep to learn more.