Obeya stand-up meeting: agenda, rhythm and who says what

The rhythm in three layers

An Obeya lives on short, fixed moments in front of the wall. Not a poster but a rhythm, with three layers that each have their own question:

Without this rhythm an Obeya is an exhibition. The rhythm turns the wall into a workplace.

The 15-minute agenda

The stand-up is short because it is held standing, in front of the wall, and because only what the wall shows can be discussed. An agenda that works:

1. Minutes 0-2: read the wall. The facilitator walks along the wall and names what is red, orange or new. No explanation, just looking.
2. Minutes 2-5: what has changed since yesterday? New deviations, completed actions, new risks.
3. Minutes 5-12: the red items. Three questions per red item: why, who picks it up, when is it done? Each item ends in an action with an owner and a date, or in the decision to leave it.
4. Minutes 12-14: yesterday’s actions. What is done, what is slipping? An action that slips gets a new date or a new owner, not silently more time.
5. Minutes 14-15: close. Any blockers that have to be solved outside the team, and who takes them along.

Longer than fifteen minutes? Then it becomes a meeting. An item that needs explanation gets an action for a separate conversation with those involved, after the stand-up.

Who says what

• The facilitator (often the owner of the Obeya) keeps time, walks along the wall and makes sure every red item gets an action. You may rotate the role; that makes the team the owner of the wall.
• The KPI owner says in one or two sentences why the number is what it is. No more.
• The action owner reports whether the action is done, and if not, when it will be.
• Everyone else listens, adds where their department knows something, and does not bring a discussion to the stand-up that belongs in a separate conversation.

An example with demo names, at Meridiaan B.V.: Sanne leads the stand-up. At the tile ‘missed appointments’ the owner says: “Red since yesterday, the reminder email went out a day late.” Sanne asks: “Who picks it up?” An action appears with a name and tomorrow’s date. Then on to the next tile.

The questions come from PDCA

The agenda looks simple, but there is a way of thinking underneath: Deming’s PDCA cycle. The same questions every time:

• Plan: what had we planned?
• Do: what happened?
• Check: where do we deviate from the goal?
• Act: which action do we start now, with an owner?

A stand-up that does not ask these four questions quickly becomes a status round: everyone tells what they have done, nobody decides anything.

The weekly session

Once a week you walk the walls together, for longer than fifteen minutes and with more attention to what does not change daily. A structure that works:

1. Plan and milestones: are we on schedule? What has to happen this week, and what is next?
2. Risks: what can still hit the project? Does every risk have an owner and a measure?
3. Decisions: what has been decided, and what still has to be decided? Record it on the wall, so nobody makes a decision twice.
4. Actions: which are older than a week? Why are they stuck?

The weekly session suits the set-up with three walls. Each wall a theme, the team walks along the walls. How to set up the room for it is in Obeya room setup.

Per period: recalibrate

Every few weeks or every quarter you ask the question you do not ask daily: are we still steering on the right things? KPIs that never turn red and never produce an action can go. A new risk or a changed goal may call for a new KPI. Keep the wall small: better five tiles that something happens with than twenty nobody looks at.

When someone is remote

In a hybrid team the stand-up is either on a laptop or on a screen in the room. Make sure the remote colleague sees the same live wall, not a screenshot. In CoVince video calling sits next to the board: the remote colleague is on the wall and the board stays in the middle. Give the remote colleague a turn in the round, not only at the end.

If you have a CrewMate in the room, you can ask it something about the numbers during the stand-up, out loud too. This is what that looks like in Stand-up with an AI colleague.

What not to do

• Sit down. Sitting, a stand-up takes twice as long.
• Discuss every tile. Discuss what is red or changing. Green needs no explanation.
• Solve problems in the stand-up. You name the problem, assign an owner and plan the conversation.
• Actions without a date. An action without a date is a wish.
• Let the numbers go stale. If nobody trusts the number, the whole stand-up is wasted. In a digital Obeya the numbers come from CoVince itself, from a CSV, from connected sources or are typed in; agree who keeps it up to date.

More about what usually goes wrong is in Why nobody looks at the Obeya wall after three months.

Checklist

• Fixed time, fixed place, fifteen minutes, standing.
• There is a facilitator; the role may rotate.
• The wall is current before the stand-up starts.
• Every red item ends in an action with an owner and a date.
• Yesterday’s actions are checked.
• Whoever is remote sees the same live wall and gets a turn.
• Weekly, walk the walls for plan, risks and decisions; per period, recalibrate the KPIs.