Emerging Leadership Team
Workshop14 min readFocus · June

Quarterly Planning

A two-day offsite agenda your team will actually use.

Focus for June

Mid-year strategic checkpoint

June: half the year is gone. Is the strategy still right?

Refreshes on the 1st of every month

The Q3 planning session is also the mid-year strategic check. Don't just choose Q3 priorities — pressure-test whether the annual plan still holds.

  • Re-pressure-test the annual plan first
  • Decide what changes for H2
  • Then choose Q3 priorities under the revised frame
  • Publish the strategic update company-wide
01

Day one — look back

  1. Welcome + ground rules (15 min)
  2. Last quarter's rocks: each owner reports done/not done with one-sentence reason (45 min)
  3. Scorecard review: trends, not just last week (45 min)
  4. Financial review: P&L, balance sheet, cash, vs. plan (60 min)
  5. Customer headlines: wins, losses, themes (30 min)
  6. Team headlines: hires, departures, capacity gaps (30 min)
  7. Lunch + walking break
  8. Issues list: brainstorm everything blocking us (45 min)
  9. IDS — Identify, Discuss, Solve top 5 issues (2 hrs)
  10. Day 1 recap and homework for tomorrow (15 min)
02

Day two — look forward

  1. Vision check: are we still pointed at the right horizon? (45 min)
  2. 1-year goals review (30 min)
  3. Brainstorm next quarter's possible rocks (60 min)
  4. Narrow to 3-7 company rocks (45 min)
  5. Each leader drafts 1-3 personal rocks (45 min)
  6. Lunch
  7. Rock SMART check: every rock has owner, deliverable, due date (60 min)
  8. Cascade plan: what gets communicated to the team and how (45 min)
  9. Calendar next quarter's offsite + book the room (10 min)
  10. Round-robin: one word for how you're leaving the offsite (10 min)
03

What to leave the room with

  • One-page quarterly plan (rocks, owners, due dates)
  • Updated scorecards published in your shared system
  • Cascade message drafted and ready to send
  • Next offsite on calendars before you leave
  • Issues list rolled forward — nothing gets lost