Building Your Operating Calendar

StartConsole does not have a built-in calendar. Your meeting schedule lives in your calendar tool — Google Calendar, Outlook, or whatever your organization uses. StartConsole is what you open during each of those meetings. This chapter shows you how to map your recurring meeting cadence so every session has a clear purpose and the right StartConsole pages ready.

How It Works

The operating rhythm is a set of recurring meetings, each anchored to a specific cadence and a specific set of StartConsole pages. You schedule the meetings in your calendar. You run them using the chapters in this guide. The data in StartConsole is the agenda.

There is no single correct cadence — the rhythm below is a recommended starting point. Adjust timing and frequency to fit your organization's scale and pace.

Recommended Meeting Cadence

Meeting	Cadence	StartConsole Pages	Guide Chapter
Annual Review	Year-end	OKRs, Portfolio, Budget, Signals	Running Your Annual Review
Q-Plan	Start of each quarter	OKRs, Initiatives, Capacity, Planning	Running Your Quarterly Planning
QBR	End of each quarter	OKRs, Portfolio, Budget, Signals	Running Your QBR
SteerCo	Monthly	Portfolio, Signals, Initiatives, Decisions	Running Your SteerCo
Portfolio Review	Bi-weekly	Portfolio, Signals, Initiatives	Running Your Portfolio Review
Executive Touchpoint	Weekly	Dashboard, Signals	Running Your Executive Touchpoint
Cluster Touchpoint	Daily or Weekly	Initiatives, Capacity	Running Your Cluster Touchpoint

Setting Up Your Calendar

Create a recurring event in your calendar tool for each meeting type. In the event description, paste the link to the relevant guide chapter and note which StartConsole pages will be used. This means anyone covering the meeting can get up to speed immediately.

For gate reviews, do not set a fixed recurrence — schedule them as needed and batch them into the monthly SteerCo or a dedicated monthly gate session, depending on your intake volume.