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What Technology to Use If You’re Running EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating System)

Entrepreneurial Operating System, is a business operation system that we’ve been using since 2018. The system is based off a book (Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business) written by lifelong entrepreneur, Gino Wickman. It’s used by over 80,000 companies worldwide, but it’s not perfect for every company.

At its core, EOS is based on six major components:

  1. Vision (crystallizing the vision and getting everyone 100% on the same page)
  2. People (ensuring you have the right people in the right seats)
  3. Data (using data to make decisions and develop an absolute pulse on the business)
  4. Issues (every business has them, successful businesses are good at solving their issues)
  5. Process (stop recreating the wheel and systematize to become more efficient)
  6. Traction (defining what’s most important and how to get there)

Louisville Geek implemented EOS in 2019.

We decided to make the investment in EOS because we were growing too fast for our own good. We knew that in order to get where we wanted to get, we needed more structure. Before EOS, we spent nearly all of our time working in the business, and very little working on the business.

If your business decides to implement EOS, we strongly recommend hiring an implementer to get you started. Some businesses try to implement EOS on their own and very few times does it go well. EOS is all about being open and honest with yourselves as a team, and it’s nice to have a third-party resource who is unbiased and can keep the implementation process flow smoothly. We hired Tom Barrett from Navigate the Journey as our EOS implementer and would definitely recommend him if your organization is considering EOS.

Surprisingly, when we first rolled out EOS, there wasn’t a specific software solution to help keep tabs on everything. EOS recently announced details on the upcoming release of the EOS One™ Software Solution so we’ll be interested to see what that entails in months to come. As a Microsoft Gold partner, we decided to stick with Microsoft apps to run EOS for our organization.

MICROSOFT PLANNER

Planner is the Microsoft 365 application we use most frequently, especially when preparing for and conducting our weekly Level 10 Meetings. The weekly, 90-minute meetings follow a strict agenda and Planner stays on the screen for nearly the entire meeting. The Level 10 agenda includes an Issues List, Weekly To-Do’s, Quarterly Rocks, Customer or Employee Headlines and Cascading Messages. All of these agenda topics live in “Buckets” on the Planner Board and “Tasks” or are added to their respective buckets. Each department has their own Planner Board.

Microsoft Planner EOS

With a simplified Kanban-based layout (similar to Trello), it’s easy for nearly every level of user to hop on, and in a couple of minutes, understand the basics. Assigning tasks takes seconds, and you can assign multiple users to each task. When a task is assigned to a user or a group of users, an email is sent. If there is a due date for the task, those who are assigned will receive a reminder email 24 hours prior to the due date which is a handy feature.

Adding Team Members to the Planner Board

Once the Planner Board has been setup, admins are able assign team members. Planner uses Office 365 groups to manage permissions, but in this instance, the Member permission will suffice as it will provide them with all necessary permissions (editing, assigning, attaching files, etc.). All Members can post updates on their assigned tasks or add issues that come up during the week that they’d like to discuss at the next meeting.

Assigning Tasks In Planner

When you’re ready to assign someone a task, there are several ways to do this. When you first create the task, you’ll be asked to name the task and are given the option to select a member to assign it to.

Each Task can have multiple attachments and links associated with them. Team members are alerted if they have incomplete tasks, and the drag and drop feature makes navigating our Level 10 meetings extremely efficient.

Microsoft Teams

Coined by Microsoft as “The Future of Meetings,” this application needs no formal introduction. Microsoft Teams exploded during the COVID-19 pandemic, rising from 20 million active users pre-COVID to reach more than 145 million today.

Like most businesses, we plan to continue with a hybrid work model for the foreseeable future. As such, the majority of our Level 10 meetings will include remote employees. Now that everyone is accustomed to video calls and knows how to navigate the interface, our hybrid/virtual meetings are equally as productive as being in the same room. Because Teams is a secure Cloud application, we use the Teams interface for file storage and sharing.

Power BI

In a Level 10 meeting, the weekly Scorecard review is the first agenda item after the segue. The scorecard is typically built on Excel and the measurables on the scorecard will vary depending on the company or department. For example, the Service team’s scorecard includes the number of closed tickets or customer satisfaction data while the sales department is tracking YTD revenue and the number of opportunities in the pipeline. The leadership scorecard will typically include the critical numbers such revenue, expenses, headcount, net profit, and so on.

Like a lot of small businesses, our data lives in silos. In other words, the applications we use to run our business (QuickBooks, Paychex, SalesForce, etc.) all include valuable insight into our business, but they are disconnected from one another. For our leadership meetings, we need data from each of those silos to give us an accurate and detailed look into what is happening with the business. Prior to us adopting Power BI, our CFO would spend 3 hours running reports and organizing the data on a spreadsheet. Because this process was done manually (and sometimes by different individuals), nobody fully trusted the data we were looking at so it was a wasted effort across the board.

With Power BI, we are able to connect to all of our applications and pull specific data into one dashboard. The best part? This is done automatically! Rather than wasting 3 hours running reports each week (that’s 156 hours each year), our CFO is able to spend her valuable time analyzing the data and making recommendations based off of real-time data. Now, the scorecard is accurate which allows us to trust the data we use to make data-driven business decisions.

Need help with EOS Technology?

Implementing EOS is a challenging investment, but if done right it can transform your business and give you a tremendous leg up on the competition. If your business is considering implementing EOS but have questions about the process or are looking for recommendations, give us a call. If you’ve already implemented EOS but find that you’re lacking the tools to keep your teams efficient and organized, let’s chat.

LET US LEAD YOUR ORGANIZATION THROUGH EOS USING THE MICROSOFT 365 SUITE.

Now that the bulk of organizations are remote, Microsoft 365 offers users the flexibility to get work done anywhere with access to email, calendars, file storage, a hub for teamwork, and productivity apps that work as one holistic solution.

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