Culture · JCIG Insights & Resources
Your Say-Do Ratio: Making Reliability Visible to Your Team
A supervisor says a new schedule will be available Friday. Friday passes. The schedule is not posted, and no explanation follows. An employee asks for a decision on equipment access. The supervisor promises to follow up but forgets. A department tells a resident it will provide an update, then leaves the person waiting.
Each incident may be small. Together, they shape whether people believe the next promise.
In the CAPTAIN framework used by Johnson Civic Impact Group, the Say-Do Ratio is a simple way to encourage leaders to take those everyday commitments seriously.
What is the Say-Do Ratio?
The basic idea is to compare promises made with promises completed.
For a useful weekly review, define the metric more precisely:
Say-Do Rate = Commitments completed by their agreed due date ÷ Commitments due in the review period × 100.
For example, if eight commitments were due this week and six were completed on time, the weekly rate is 75%. The calculation is not a scientific measure of trust and it does not capture every dimension of integrity. It is simply a visible indicator that can lead to better questions.
Which two commitments were missed? Did the leader tell the affected people before the deadline? Was a new expectation agreed upon? What system would prevent the same miss?
A number alone does not produce trust. Consistent, transparent action does.
The importance of making fewer, clearer promises
Supervisors often make informal commitments without realizing it. “I'll find out.” “I'll get back with you.” “I'll check that.” Those words set an expectation, even when they were spoken in a hallway between meetings.
A useful promise has four parts: the action, the owner, the deadline, and the recipient who needs the result.
Instead of “I'll look into the work order,” say, “I'll check the status and send you an update by 3:00 p.m. tomorrow.” The second statement is specific enough to track and follow through.
In government, a supervisor must also avoid promising an outcome that depends on another department's approval, a formal procurement action, a council decision, or legal review. Promise the update or action you can control, not an outcome beyond your authority.
What should happen when you cannot deliver?
Sometimes the facts change. A storm shifts crew priorities. A vendor is delayed. A department must wait for authorization. Reliability does not require pretending those changes never happen.
A trustworthy response includes early notice, the reason for the change, a revised commitment within your authority, and a clear next update.
For tracking purposes, don't quietly erase the original deadline because you rescheduled. Record that the original commitment changed, whether the affected person was informed in time, and whether the updated commitment was kept.
That distinction matters. An organization can create a perfect-looking score by continually moving deadlines. The real point is to make follow-through more visible, not to manipulate the measurement.
Run a 15-minute Friday Say-Do review
First, list the promises due this week. Include relevant commitments to employees, colleagues, leadership, and residents. Use authorized tracking systems for public or personnel matters.
Second, mark the status honestly. Complete on time, revised with advance notice, missed, or pending. Record the next owner and due date.
Third, look for the pattern. Are you promising too much? Is work waiting on approvals? Is no one responsible for a handoff? Are you forgetting follow-up conversations because they are not recorded?
Fourth, close the loops. Respond to people who were left waiting. Resolve what can be resolved, make a specific new commitment where appropriate, and change one part of the workflow.
Fifth, repeat. One weekly check is useful. A repeated routine changes behavior.
A supervisor's example
A department supervisor promises three employee check-ins, a revised crew schedule, an equipment update, and a resident response. The schedule and two check-ins are completed on time. The equipment update is delayed, but the team receives advance notice and a new date. The third check-in and resident response are missed with no notice.
The most valuable lesson is not only the percentage. It is recognizing that two people waited without an update—and deciding how to prevent that next week.
What happens Monday morning?
Ask supervisors to capture every new commitment they make during the week in one approved location. At week's end, review those commitments and notify anyone waiting on an overdue item.
Your word becomes more reliable when you create a repeatable way to keep it.
JCIG helps municipalities practice follow-through, accountability, and integrity through its applied Civic Leadership Academy and Supervisor Readiness Bootcamp.
Schedule a leadership strategy conversation to explore how supervisors can strengthen reliability across your organization.
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