Working on Priorities

Focus on the most important priorities for yourself, your team and your company

Open in New Tab →

How to Add Priorities

In Rhythm, Priorities are the top projects or goals you are working on for the quarter or year. Once you've had your planning session with your team and determine which 3-5 Priorities to focus on, you are ready to add them in Rhythm. 

1. In the Execution menu, choose Priorities.
2. Hit the + in the top right of the screen.
3. Give your Priority a name that includes a verb. Make it specific and clear what you will do. 
   Need help writing a clear, actionable goal name? Click on the Rhythm AI Coach icon to generate suggestions. Clicking it again will generate even more possibilities to help you easily write a Priority.
4. Set the right time frame for the Priority; is it Quarter or Annual?
5. Set Red-Yellow-Green success criteria. Clarify and align around the specific outcome for this Priority.
6. Set a Start and End Date.
7. Establish one clear Owner to ensure someone is accountable for this Priority.
8. Determine if this Priority is a top focus for the whole team or for you as an individual.
   1. If it’s an Individual Priority, you can make it private, meaning that only you can see it.
   2. If it's a Team Priority, you can check the box to add it to the Quarter or Annual Plan Goal Dashboard. (Note that it will appear in the dashboard for the team you have selected in the app context when you created the goal.)
9. Hit Save or Save and Link Parent to show how this Priority supports other goals for your Team or Company.

As a best practice,  you should identify 3-5 milestone Tasks for each Individual Quarter Priority to build out your project plan and stay accountable for getting the work done. For Team Priorities, add Child Priorities and/or Tasks to stay aligned with the team on work being done.

You also have some optional settings when creating a Priority:

1. Rollup Calculation: You can turn on math calculations to sum or average linked Child goals on this Priority.
2. Auto Status Color Setting: You can turn on a setting so Rhythm updates the status automatically each week by comparing the Actual value you enter to the values in the Red-Yellow-Green success criteria.
3. Variance Calculation: You can turn on a setting to automatically calculate the Variance when you add Projected and Actual values each week.
4. Projected, Actual, Variance Setting: You can adjust this setting to specify whether the numbers you enter each week are cumulative (a running total of prior weeks) or for a single week only. This setting will be used to chart the data correctly.
5. Status Frequency: Choose how often you want to update the status of this Priority. We recommend updating the status weekly for Quarterly Priorities and at least Quarterly for Annual Priorities.
6. Ratings on Impact and Ability to Execute: If you are brainstorming which Priorities to pursue this quarter, you can rate them all and go to the Flat > Quadrant Chart view to see them plotted on a chart. This is a helpful tool to narrow down a list of potential Priorities and see where to devote your energy.
7. Goal Description: You can explain the Priority in detail or include an objective statement to clarify the purpose of the goal.

How to Remove Priorities

1. Removing a Priority from your list: If you no longer wish to see a Priority from prior quarters in your list for this quarter, click on the End Date for the Priority and choose to end the Priority at the end of the previous quarter. This will preserve any historical data associated with the Priority but prevent it from showing up in the current quarter’s list.
2. Deleting a Priority: If you added a Priority by mistake and don’t have any historical data in previous quarters for the Priority, you can delete it by clicking the More Actions icon in the list and choosing Delete from System.