The First Quarter Reality Check

A Friday afternoon quarterly review meeting at an office in Seattle. Rachel, the new head of operations at Northwind Logistics, asks her team for an unvarnished assessment of her leadership style and her 100-day plan so far.

The First Quarter Reality Check

True or false?

Rachel asks her team for honest feedback at the end of her first quarter.

• True
• False

Josh admits that he kept a printed copy of Rachel's original 100-day plan.

• True
• False

Brandon was actually ticking off the completed items on Rachel's plan in his notebook.

• True
• False

Rachel believes her leadership presence never felt like micromanagement.

• True
• False

At the end of the meeting, the team gets back to reviewing new budget requests.

• True
• False

Listen again and complete the sentences

• Rachel: Alright team, it's been exactly ninety days since I stepped into this role, and I really need a proper reality check from you all. Don't hold back — I want to know where I'm failing and where we need to ____ before our next stakeholder map goes live.
• Rachel: Ouch, Josh. That's fair, though. I was eager to ____ and build credibility with the senior directors in Austin. But I realize now I should've involved you guys in the quick assessment phase.
• Rachel: I can see why it came across that way. I was mapping out priorities so fast that my leadership presence probably felt more like micromanagement. Did we lose all our ____ because of that?
• Josh: Not quite. ____ , once you stopped trying to fix everything at once and let's handle the supply chain delays independently, things got much better. That was a defining moment for the team.

Sources: photo by Matheus Bertelli on Pexels