How to follow-up to actually get work done …
… and why it begins with setting expectations clearly
We’ve all been on the follow-up merry-go-around:
Day 1: Hey, just checking in on the content brief you were going to share?
A: It’s been a crazy day. I should have it by tomorrow.
Day2: Hey, just following up on the content brief.
A: Oh man. I started working on it but got pulled into something. Will share by EOD today.
Day 3: Hey, wanted to see if the brief’s ready to go?
A: Ugh, I had a client call that went on forever. EOD today, pakka. …(you know the drill)
As a young professional, I was surprised by what a big part of getting work done was following up with other people.
The reality is that we all have more on our to-do lists than hours in the day. Not all of it can get done. Somethings will drop. In such a context, how do you make sure that your action items aren’t the ones to fall by the wayside?
Turns out, follow-ups actually work when you’ve set clear expectations to begin with.
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Set expectations clearly
You’ll be amazed how often work doesn’t happen because people aren’t clear on what needs to be done.
You must’ve experienced this. I know I have. Procrastinating on a complex task because I’m unclear, “Where do I start? What do I need to do?” James Clear says, “What looks like lack of motivation, is many times lack of clarity. Its not always clear when and where to take action.”
Before you default into assuming people are slipping up on the work, check if they are clear on what needs to be done and why. Never underestimate this.
If you need to get work done, it’s a part of your job to nudge that clarity. Even when you think you’ve been clear, check, “Hey, let’s all recap what we need to do and by when? Is there anything you need to get going on your task?”
What do clear expectations look like? Here’s a three-step checklist:
1.a. Why does the work matter? | Link to company priorities
All of us want to do work that matters. Inside a company, that’s work that links to company’s priorities. The first step to getting work prioritised by other teams is be clear on how it impacts their goals and metrics. The more directly the work contributes to the partner team’s goals, the more they’ll prioritise it.
As a young professional, this is one where you can take your manager’s help. Your manager can help get the partner team’s buy-in. You can also ask the partner team, “where does this sit in priorities? Does this impact your goals?” Based on what you hear back, work with your manager to make the bridge to partner team’s goals.
One way to do this is to invite a leader talk to the team about why the initiative matters — how it helps the customer, and what it unlocks for the company.
Another mechanism is to have the initiative included in the org’s scorecard. This way it’s part of the priorities and progress is reviewed with leadership at a regular cadence.
These mechanisms go great lengths in helping partner teams prioritise the work.
1.b. What exactly needs to be done? | Expected output and what good looks like
A lot of work gets delayed because people aren’t sure what’s actually expected. Is it a slide or an Excel file? Do we need to share one clear recommendation, or three different scenarios?
It really helps to talk about this upfront. Take five minutes to align on what the final output should look like — even better if you can give an example or sketch.
For example:
“We need 2–3 slides that tell the story clearly enough for the leadership deck.”
“Just a quick spreadsheet — no formatting needed, but the logic should be clear.”
The clearer the ask, the faster people can get started — and the less back-and-forth later.
Pro tip: Sometimes we don’t get clarity on desired outcome because… well, the leaders are not sure themselves. If you sense that this is the case, you need to help the manager help you. Don’t get stuck — just take your best guess and put together a rough version. It’s often easier to get feedback once people can see something.
You can offer, “Will it be helpful if I make a V1 based on what I’ve understood? and then we can review and tweak basis inputs.”
Or even more proactively offer: “I wasn’t sure what format we needed, so I made a quick slide and a table — let me know what’s closer to what you had in mind.”
Even a scrappy V1 can save hours of going in the wrong direction. And with AI tools now, it’s faster than ever to get that first draft out.
1.c. What is the deadline, and what happens if we miss it?
Too often, people are dealing with everything being due by EOD today. In such a scenario, they’re forced to take ad hoc calls on what to actually do today; and what spills to the next day.
How do you ensure that your action item gets done when it’s needed to? Have a deadline for each action item AND be explicit on why the deadline matters and what happens if we miss it.
One way to do this is link the timelines to an external milestone, “We need inputs by X date so we can incorporate them for the launch.”
Another is to link it to an internal leadership check-in, “We need an approval in the leadership review on the 10th, so let’s all collate our inputs by 6th, so we can review and align in time for the pre-read.”
Pro tip: You might be feeling hesitant to assign timelines to other folks. (That is a skill you should build and topic for another day) In the meantime, here’s a workaround: At the end of the working team sync, go around the room and each person commits by when they’ll share the work. Everyone assigns a due date to themselves. This way there’s more ownership too. Only caveat is, you’ll have to check these committed dates work with external dependencies.
These are the three steps to ensure expectations are set clearly: why the work matters, what’s the desired outcome, what’s the deadline (and what happens when we miss it). If folks are clear on these, it becomes much easier to follow up.
How to follow-up effectively? Meet the colour coded tracker.
Step 2: Track progress with the colour coded tracker
The simple, scalable, surprisingly effective mechanism for following up on execution is the colour coded tracker.
What is it: The colour coded tracker starts out as a simple summary table – with action item, owner, timelines. Then, as time progresses, its circulated with last column colour coded basis status of each action item. Say, red for delayed, yellow for upcoming and green for done
Why it works: The colour coded tracker taps into one behavioural truth: people move faster when their progress is visible to others. This is called the social accountability and visibility effect. Nobody wants to be the single red in the ocean of greens.
How to put it to use: At the end of the team meeting, recap action items and timelines for each person. Then, when you send out the minutes of the meeting, include a simple recap table. This becomes an easy reference for everyone to know they need to do.
Post that, update and resend the same table colour coding the status of each action item. Red for delayed; yellow for upcoming; and green for done.
This simple visual reminder helps get work done. Nobody likes to be the one causing the delay, so seeing your own name in red serves as a surprisingly effective nudge in driving accountability to committed timelines.
Pro Tip: If your workplace doesn’t have the culture of colour coded trackers – well, it’s a valuable best practice you could start it for your working group. Talk to your manager and kick it off! Till that happens, do the follow-ups via chat, or WhatsApp or whatever is the norm. The channel matters less – what matters more is 1. Everyone’s assigned action items are jotted down in one place 2. Folks can see what they need to do; and what others have done. Find a way to do this, and it’ll be super effective in getting work done.
Step 3: If there’s a delay, switch to root-cause and unblock mode
The colour coded tracker gives scale to follow-ups. It’s quite effective, but life isn’t perfect. Delays still happen.
Whenever you sense that work is getting stuck somewhere you need to switch from these scaled, generic follow-ups to root-cause-and-unblock-mode. If a person’s action item’s getting delayed, you might want to top up with a one-on-one note checking, “Hey, where are things getting stuck and how can I help us get going on this?”
Talk to the person, understand where things are at.
Observe what’s going on with their team, and connect the dots if it can delay your deliverable. For example, if the partner team has a launch or leadership visit coming up – there’s a good chance your work could get de-pried.
If there’s a delay, your first task is to figure out why. Here’s a handy checklist – run through this – and figure out which one is impacting your work.
When someone hasn’t done the action item they’d committed to do:
Are they clear on why the work matters? Are they clear on how this links to their goals and metrics?
Are they clear on what they need to do? Desired output?
Are they clear on what happens if they miss the deadline? What’s the dependency?
Is their manager aligned?
Do they have everything they need to do the work? The tools, access, resources? (Just ask them!)
Can they do it? (Capability check. Again – ask them, “Have you done this before? Do you want to discuss the approach once so we’re on the same page? Maybe we can loop in xyz to guide because they’ve done this before.”)
Pro tip: Don’t wait for the work to slip; you can check for all of these before you start. This way, you can anticipate potential blockers early and you have time to sort it out. This is one easy way to get proactive and level up your execution skills.
You’ll see reasons related to setting-expectations clearly at top of the list. Those are very common. If that’s the reason your work is getting stuck, you can work with the partner team mate get yourself unblocked. (If there’s some doubts on this, comment below, and I’ll try to help).
There will be places you’ll need to loop in your manager. How do you know when to unblock yourself and when to loop in your manager? How do you escalate so you don’t seem like you’re tattling on your colleagues? We cover this next week in “How to escalate to get work done (while making relationships stronger)
Other posts in “Most Underrated skills for Early Career Success”:
Skill #1: Asking and actioning feedback: the skill that helps you improve on every other skill
Skill #2: Saying no – the skill that preserves your time + resources for work that matters most (Part 1 and Part 2)