When Daily Meetings Go Awry

What happened when I lost my cool in our daily quality huddle

Sam Ochstein
2 min readAug 28, 2023
Photo by Jason Goodman on Unsplash

I messed up the other day.

During our daily 8:30 a.m. quality huddle I got passionate, to put it charitably.

“What the hell is going on in that department?!?!” I yelled after learning about yet another quality problem for a part that we had been making for a long time with minimal issues, but now had all manner of defects produced daily.

“And why don’t any of the Leaders or Coordinators know what’s going on when we ask them?” I rapidly followed.

Not my finest moment.

Kind of an epic fail, really.

And definitely not my MO.

The next morning my boss and I had a chat.

He was far more gracious than he could have been or should have been.

He acknowledged the pressure I was under to perform well and get our KPIs in line.

But that was no excuse for my outburst.

People don’t respond to shouting. That’s not good leadership. We need to be better.

I agreed.

It was poignant coaching.

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Sam Ochstein

Former Pastor | Reader | Writer | Walker | Whiskey Lover | Contemplative Extrovert | MMin, MATS