Quarterly ritual · Seen at GE

Work-Out Session

Cross-functional teams identify wasteful approvals, reports and meetings; a leader must answer each proposal on the spot.

Why it matters

GE’s Work-Out programme brought employees together to identify unnecessary work and put proposals directly to a manager, who had to say yes, no, or commit to an answer within a set time. Instant decisions build trust that speaking up actually changes things.

How to run it

Gather a cross-functional group that touches the same process.
List the waste: approvals, reports, meetings and handoffs that add little value.
Turn the worst items into proposals.
The leader decides live: yes, no, or a firm answer within a short, fixed window.
Publish the decisions and follow up.

Watch out for

Decision-makers deferring everything “for further review”

Sources

Ulrich, Kerr & Ashkenas, The GE Work-Out (2002)

Keep exploring

Nudge

The Curse of Knowledge

Once you understand something, it becomes very hard to imagine not understanding it — which is why leaders consistently overestimate how clearly their priorities have landed.

2-minute read13 Oct 2026

Article

Culture doesn’t die of apathy. It dies of friction.

When people stop recognising colleagues or sharing ideas, leaders blame motivation. Usually the real culprit is how hard we’ve made the right behaviour.

1 Oct 2026

Nudge

You Cannot Kill Your Own Project

The person who launched a failing project is the person least able to stop it — not from stubbornness, but because stopping means admitting the original call was wrong.

2-minute read29 Aug 2026