ManagementFilter: One-on-One Meetings?
January 16, 2020 6:47 AM Subscribe
Do you and others on your team have regular one-on-one meetings with your manager? What do you talk about? Do you find them useful? What about them do you find useful? What's not useful? Etc....
I'm a relatively newly-minted manager (well, assistant manager, but the actual manager is largely preoccupied by a Giant Important Project these days, so I got tapped to fill this role, which had not existed previously). Our team (7 total) meets once week to talk about what we're all up to, what's coming down the pike, issues we all need to pay attention to, etc... I brought up to the manager that I'd like to have biweekly one-on-ones with all our reports, he thought it's a great idea, but this is not something we've ever done in this department before. I'd like to hear from those who have these types of meetings with their bosses what goes on in them.
Just for added context, our daily work is a mix of giving on-demand support to internal clients, giving group and individual trainings, and working on larger, longer-term projects.
I'm a relatively newly-minted manager (well, assistant manager, but the actual manager is largely preoccupied by a Giant Important Project these days, so I got tapped to fill this role, which had not existed previously). Our team (7 total) meets once week to talk about what we're all up to, what's coming down the pike, issues we all need to pay attention to, etc... I brought up to the manager that I'd like to have biweekly one-on-ones with all our reports, he thought it's a great idea, but this is not something we've ever done in this department before. I'd like to hear from those who have these types of meetings with their bosses what goes on in them.
Just for added context, our daily work is a mix of giving on-demand support to internal clients, giving group and individual trainings, and working on larger, longer-term projects.
I work in the non-profit world, so maybe different in yours. But every place I have ever worked the expectation is that managers have "supervisions" - ie 1 on 1 meetings - with their supervisees on a regular basis. Some supervisors do this on a weekly basis, some on a bi-weekly basis, some maybe less often than that but generally that's seen as suspect.
The question of whether its "useful" is more up for grabs; depends on the supervisor and supervised, and how you approach. A lot of folks are terrible at actually doing them, and just waste an hour of time on minutae. I try to be thoughtful when I supervise my staff, and we do different amounts of time and topic depending on what's needed; its not the same every time. Its useful for generally staying on track and knowing how staff is approaching things, but if you don't communicate well and really focus, it can also just be a book report you could've accomplished via email or in passing.
Fundamentally, the goal of supervision is one of three things - administrative (are you getting your assignments done) educational (supervisor "teaching" the supervised how to get things done, providing direction) and supportive (emotional support through tough, stressful times). Any supervision might be 1 or 2 or 3 of these things, depends on what's needed at the time.
Reading between the lines, my advice for you is to not have a catch-all for every single person - depending on one's role, someone might need weekly supervision, some bi-weekly, some might need an hour, some 30 minutes, etc. Supervise to needs, not structure.
posted by RajahKing at 6:56 AM on January 16, 2020 [4 favorites]
The question of whether its "useful" is more up for grabs; depends on the supervisor and supervised, and how you approach. A lot of folks are terrible at actually doing them, and just waste an hour of time on minutae. I try to be thoughtful when I supervise my staff, and we do different amounts of time and topic depending on what's needed; its not the same every time. Its useful for generally staying on track and knowing how staff is approaching things, but if you don't communicate well and really focus, it can also just be a book report you could've accomplished via email or in passing.
Fundamentally, the goal of supervision is one of three things - administrative (are you getting your assignments done) educational (supervisor "teaching" the supervised how to get things done, providing direction) and supportive (emotional support through tough, stressful times). Any supervision might be 1 or 2 or 3 of these things, depends on what's needed at the time.
Reading between the lines, my advice for you is to not have a catch-all for every single person - depending on one's role, someone might need weekly supervision, some bi-weekly, some might need an hour, some 30 minutes, etc. Supervise to needs, not structure.
posted by RajahKing at 6:56 AM on January 16, 2020 [4 favorites]
I have generally found them quite stressful as an employee. They usually get rescheduled a million times because the manager is busy, but the responsibility for ensuring they take place tends to fall on me, like it's my fault the manager wants to have the meeting but doesn't care enough to prioritize it over literally anything else. They also feel like command performances in which I'm being judged on some mysterious basis -- like mini-annual reviews, except with even less structure.
Fortunately, in all cases where they were supposed to happen, we inevitably had one or two and then a few that didn't happen and then another one and then they stopped.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:58 AM on January 16, 2020 [4 favorites]
Fortunately, in all cases where they were supposed to happen, we inevitably had one or two and then a few that didn't happen and then another one and then they stopped.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:58 AM on January 16, 2020 [4 favorites]
I do them with reports to do a couple of things:
1) Get more info about what they're up to, workload, etc
2) Find out if there's anything bugging them or preventing them from doing their work
3) Providing any feedback I have in a timely manner
This is in a "knowledge worker" officey white-collar environment.
posted by chesty_a_arthur at 7:02 AM on January 16, 2020 [4 favorites]
1) Get more info about what they're up to, workload, etc
2) Find out if there's anything bugging them or preventing them from doing their work
3) Providing any feedback I have in a timely manner
This is in a "knowledge worker" officey white-collar environment.
posted by chesty_a_arthur at 7:02 AM on January 16, 2020 [4 favorites]
I have a weekly half-hour one-on-one *scheduled* with my manager, but we don't actually have it every week. Its main purpose is to hold a space in her week where I know I can get her full attention to review any issues/questions that I may have been saving up because I couldn't otherwise catch her since she's constantly in meetings, nudge her to do whatever I'm waiting for her to do, etc.
I let her know the morning of the meeting whether I have anything I want to meet about, and if not, we cancel. If we have the meeting, I bring the agenda and it's just "whatever I want to focus her attention on." Usually that's "I'm waiting for you to do xyz", sometimes with a side order of "just so you know, faculty member Y is pissed off because laws exist and he has to follow them, I think I've calmed him down but if you hear from him, here's what you should know about what actually happened" or "this weird situation came up that's outside our usual parameters, here's how I'm thinking of handling it, please give me a sanity check on whether you're cool with that or whether I'm missing something that would suggest a different approach."
In practice I would say we probably average out to meeting every other week, but it sort of ebbs and flows. Sometimes things are busy and we need that time every week, and then we might go a month without meeting because things are calm and whatever we needed to discuss we handled in our five minute chat at the coffee machine.
I've had other bosses with whom one-on-ones were an absolutely stomach-churningly horrible march through Everything My Boss Was Mad About That Week and demanding information he'd never asked me for and then being mad when I didn't have it. Those meetings were awful and the low point of my week.
Which is to say I don't think the one-on-one is a good or bad idea in and of itself, but can be great or terrible depending on the manager.
posted by Stacey at 7:10 AM on January 16, 2020 [12 favorites]
I let her know the morning of the meeting whether I have anything I want to meet about, and if not, we cancel. If we have the meeting, I bring the agenda and it's just "whatever I want to focus her attention on." Usually that's "I'm waiting for you to do xyz", sometimes with a side order of "just so you know, faculty member Y is pissed off because laws exist and he has to follow them, I think I've calmed him down but if you hear from him, here's what you should know about what actually happened" or "this weird situation came up that's outside our usual parameters, here's how I'm thinking of handling it, please give me a sanity check on whether you're cool with that or whether I'm missing something that would suggest a different approach."
In practice I would say we probably average out to meeting every other week, but it sort of ebbs and flows. Sometimes things are busy and we need that time every week, and then we might go a month without meeting because things are calm and whatever we needed to discuss we handled in our five minute chat at the coffee machine.
I've had other bosses with whom one-on-ones were an absolutely stomach-churningly horrible march through Everything My Boss Was Mad About That Week and demanding information he'd never asked me for and then being mad when I didn't have it. Those meetings were awful and the low point of my week.
Which is to say I don't think the one-on-one is a good or bad idea in and of itself, but can be great or terrible depending on the manager.
posted by Stacey at 7:10 AM on January 16, 2020 [12 favorites]
Yeah, this is a critical management activity. Gallup's workplace research has shown that employees whose managers hold regular meetings with them are three times as likely to be engaged as employees whose managers do not.
I have a 45 minute block of time with each of my employees every week (plus whatever other meetings end up occurring to address project needs). I start with a general chat with them about what's going on in their life, we move on to review critical issues in their work, and then talk about any long-term stuff, including their growth and development. I expect them to mostly drive the agenda on the second and third items, but I have a list of what I want to cover, too.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 7:15 AM on January 16, 2020 [12 favorites]
I have a 45 minute block of time with each of my employees every week (plus whatever other meetings end up occurring to address project needs). I start with a general chat with them about what's going on in their life, we move on to review critical issues in their work, and then talk about any long-term stuff, including their growth and development. I expect them to mostly drive the agenda on the second and third items, but I have a list of what I want to cover, too.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 7:15 AM on January 16, 2020 [12 favorites]
I've had these at my two most recent jobs. I found neither productive, but I believe that's due more to my managers' general incompetence and my own nonchalance. The concept is a good one if it's executed well, though.
The specific I've had is that everyone opens the meeting by saying "so, how's it going?", to which I answer "fine", and that's the end of productive discussion. My advice to you is to ask more specific questions. "What project is taking up most of your time?" "Is there a skill you need that you don't have?" Etc. Ideally, you'd have a pretty good idea of what each employee is doing and where their pain points are, so you can ask about those. To my current manager's credit, one question she's been asking me recently is "is there anything you need from me to do your job?". It's a bit more open-ended than I'd like, but it gets to what, to me, is the basic concept of leadership and management: putting people in position to succeed.
The other thing I'd suggest is to have some constructive criticism ready, drawn from your annual review procedure. One of the worst things I've ever experienced at work was in my first job, like 15 years ago, when my manager blindside me at my first annual review with all the things I'd done wrong my first year. We had weekly one-on-one meetings, and chatted frequently on top of those. Why didn't I hear about any of these issues before the review? And when you do give constructive criticism, follow up on it a few weeks later. "Hey, how's that [whatever] that we talked about a couple of weeks ago going?"
And yeah, please don't reschedule. That sends the message that there are other things more important than the employee you're meeting with. While it's probably true, it sucks for that employee to get that message.
Oh, and don't schedule the meetings for 4:30pm on a Thursday. That happened to me once, and I spent the entire week cleaning up my desk and stuff thinking I was going to get fired.
posted by kevinbelt at 7:16 AM on January 16, 2020 [6 favorites]
The specific I've had is that everyone opens the meeting by saying "so, how's it going?", to which I answer "fine", and that's the end of productive discussion. My advice to you is to ask more specific questions. "What project is taking up most of your time?" "Is there a skill you need that you don't have?" Etc. Ideally, you'd have a pretty good idea of what each employee is doing and where their pain points are, so you can ask about those. To my current manager's credit, one question she's been asking me recently is "is there anything you need from me to do your job?". It's a bit more open-ended than I'd like, but it gets to what, to me, is the basic concept of leadership and management: putting people in position to succeed.
The other thing I'd suggest is to have some constructive criticism ready, drawn from your annual review procedure. One of the worst things I've ever experienced at work was in my first job, like 15 years ago, when my manager blindside me at my first annual review with all the things I'd done wrong my first year. We had weekly one-on-one meetings, and chatted frequently on top of those. Why didn't I hear about any of these issues before the review? And when you do give constructive criticism, follow up on it a few weeks later. "Hey, how's that [whatever] that we talked about a couple of weeks ago going?"
And yeah, please don't reschedule. That sends the message that there are other things more important than the employee you're meeting with. While it's probably true, it sucks for that employee to get that message.
Oh, and don't schedule the meetings for 4:30pm on a Thursday. That happened to me once, and I spent the entire week cleaning up my desk and stuff thinking I was going to get fired.
posted by kevinbelt at 7:16 AM on January 16, 2020 [6 favorites]
I love my 1:1 meetings that I have twice a month. She goes over anything regarding the project I'm working on that I might not know or she wants to put emphasis on. She gives me feedback on my current work. And she gives me a chance to ask questions. The best thing is that she doesn't try to fill the time and she doesn't bother to reschedule them if she has a conflict in her schedule. Sometimes our meetings are only five minutes because we don't have much to talk about. Sometimes they are 30 if a lot is going on.
posted by ilovewinter at 7:26 AM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by ilovewinter at 7:26 AM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
I have one of these with my manager every week. 30 minutes every Tuesday morning. It will get cancelled due to schedule conflicts a few times each year (mostly when she's traveling or on vacation), but its pretty consistent overall. We don't reschedule if there is a conflict. If something is urgent, we should talk about it when it comes up - if it isn't urgent, it can wait another week.
We have a google doc that we put bullet notes on throughout the week of things we want to talk about so we don't forget. It isn't like a performance review, it's mostly things I want to share with her to make sure she knows, things I have questions about, or questions I have for other departments that aren't getting answered and need to be asked at a higher level. She also has questions or requests sometimes, but 80% of the content comes from me.
We usually don't use the whole 30 minutes, we call it about 10 minutes early most of the time. If neither of us have anything on the doc, we still meet. We often think of something if we're just given the opportunity to sit down together. But if we don't we just talk about our weekends for 5 minutes and call it early.
Urgent things still go to her in real-time, but most of my stuff isn't that urgent. This lets her get everything I need all at once with all of the context of a face to face meeting.
It's also just pleasant. I know I have her full attention for 30 minutes each week to talk privately about anything I want.
posted by Garm at 7:44 AM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
We have a google doc that we put bullet notes on throughout the week of things we want to talk about so we don't forget. It isn't like a performance review, it's mostly things I want to share with her to make sure she knows, things I have questions about, or questions I have for other departments that aren't getting answered and need to be asked at a higher level. She also has questions or requests sometimes, but 80% of the content comes from me.
We usually don't use the whole 30 minutes, we call it about 10 minutes early most of the time. If neither of us have anything on the doc, we still meet. We often think of something if we're just given the opportunity to sit down together. But if we don't we just talk about our weekends for 5 minutes and call it early.
Urgent things still go to her in real-time, but most of my stuff isn't that urgent. This lets her get everything I need all at once with all of the context of a face to face meeting.
It's also just pleasant. I know I have her full attention for 30 minutes each week to talk privately about anything I want.
posted by Garm at 7:44 AM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
I think they key to having these meetings be successful is using the time productively, and getting as detailed as possible in your discussion with direct reports. Don't just ask "How are things going?" and then move on, but ask specifically about XYZ project, any tasks that there have been issues with, how they feel about their workload generally and give feedback as needed. Talk about projects that are upcoming and check in every once in a while about development goals and what you can help with, if anything. Like ilovewinter said, don't feel like you need to take up the entire time, either - sometimes my 1:1 with my manager will go to the full half hour we have allocated, but sometimes it'll only be 5 or 10 minutes if neither of us has anything to discuss besides the basic check in.
posted by odd ghost at 7:47 AM on January 16, 2020
posted by odd ghost at 7:47 AM on January 16, 2020
I have usually had 1 on 1s, in nonprofits. At my previous job they were 2x a month, now they are once a week, typically an hour but often shorter than that. Overall I like them because it's a dedicated time to deal with any issues my supervisor needs to weigh in on and they help me stay in touch with organizational priorities.
At my last two jobs I have had a form that I prep that is basically:
1. Usually ~5 items that I want to discuss (questions, updates, anything I need approved to move forward on)
2. List of what I'm prioritizing over the next week or two (I personally think this has the potential to end up a little micromanager-y, but typically within the meeting it has just been a formality rather than something that is discussed at length)
3. List of what is on the back burner and longer term projects/goals
I currently also have a once monthly update meeting with the exec director (one level up from my supervisor), where I have to give updates on my work and prepare a story that I find interesting/inspiring. I dread that meeting because it feels like there's pressure to give the "right" answers and I don't feel like I get anything useful out of it-- it's all about feeding her information rather than a back and forth that informs my work.
posted by geegollygosh at 7:55 AM on January 16, 2020
At my last two jobs I have had a form that I prep that is basically:
1. Usually ~5 items that I want to discuss (questions, updates, anything I need approved to move forward on)
2. List of what I'm prioritizing over the next week or two (I personally think this has the potential to end up a little micromanager-y, but typically within the meeting it has just been a formality rather than something that is discussed at length)
3. List of what is on the back burner and longer term projects/goals
I currently also have a once monthly update meeting with the exec director (one level up from my supervisor), where I have to give updates on my work and prepare a story that I find interesting/inspiring. I dread that meeting because it feels like there's pressure to give the "right" answers and I don't feel like I get anything useful out of it-- it's all about feeding her information rather than a back and forth that informs my work.
posted by geegollygosh at 7:55 AM on January 16, 2020
I still use a technique I learned from manager-tools.com like 15 years ago for one-on-ones. They should be 30 minutes long. First 10 minutes are led by the employee - it's their chance to ask questions about things they are working on, bring up challenges or successes, etc. It should not be a run down of their to do list. The second 10 minutes are for the manager to tell the employee about things they need/want to know - other projects going on in other departments, greater context from the organization as a whole, etc. Again, it should not be the time to assign a bunch of new tasks, although you can use it to talk about a new project that the employee will be a part of. The last 10 minutes should be to talk about their professional development - ask them if there's anything they are struggling with and want training or support, or what they are feeling accomplished about and want to do more of.
They should rarely be cancelled or rescheduled, and are not a substitute for regular day-to-day conversation. The hardest part is not falling into the habit of "saving" things for the meeting that can easily be handled over email or discussed in the moment, because then you fall into the trap of just going through to do lists/status updates. The meeting is best for bigger picture conversations that benefit from distraction-free one-on-one time together.
posted by misskaz at 7:56 AM on January 16, 2020 [4 favorites]
They should rarely be cancelled or rescheduled, and are not a substitute for regular day-to-day conversation. The hardest part is not falling into the habit of "saving" things for the meeting that can easily be handled over email or discussed in the moment, because then you fall into the trap of just going through to do lists/status updates. The meeting is best for bigger picture conversations that benefit from distraction-free one-on-one time together.
posted by misskaz at 7:56 AM on January 16, 2020 [4 favorites]
I meet with my direct reports 1:1 once per week. These meetings typically involve a brief update on work done in the past week and planned for the coming week. If an employee is having any easy week, the meeting will be very short and to-the-point. If they’re having a busy week, or have questions/concerns/issues, we take time to discuss/address them. (Employees also bring my questions/concerns during the week, but they often seem not to realize smaller things are on their mind until I ask.)
I’ve tried and dislike formulaic approaches... So now I focus on learning about how they are doing (I ask a lot of open-ended questions) while tailoring every meeting to each employee’s unique needs of the week.
posted by shb at 8:11 AM on January 16, 2020
I’ve tried and dislike formulaic approaches... So now I focus on learning about how they are doing (I ask a lot of open-ended questions) while tailoring every meeting to each employee’s unique needs of the week.
posted by shb at 8:11 AM on January 16, 2020
I have a 1:1 with my manager every other week, and then the team meets in the off week (plus we have a virtual happy hour once a month; we're all remote). We touch on every active project I'm assigned to, she tells me what's coming that hasn't been assigned yet, we touch base on where I am on my current training plan, and if I need additional resources or have identified a potential project issue that hasn't otherwise been communicated we discuss it then. She's a bit of a documenter, so there is just a long email string she replies to at every meeting to cover everything we talked about.
These meetings always make me slightly anxious but they are still important. It's often the only time we get to talk privately. I have had these in the past where they were frequently overwritten by other meetings or no-showed when my manager was too busy, and it was super offputting. They're pretty sacred here unless someone's traveling or on PTO.
posted by Lyn Never at 9:17 AM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
These meetings always make me slightly anxious but they are still important. It's often the only time we get to talk privately. I have had these in the past where they were frequently overwritten by other meetings or no-showed when my manager was too busy, and it was super offputting. They're pretty sacred here unless someone's traveling or on PTO.
posted by Lyn Never at 9:17 AM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
I think this is an extremely useful article on how to manage one on one's, including some of the pain points that have been brought up here (being overwritten etc.)
posted by valoius at 9:32 AM on January 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by valoius at 9:32 AM on January 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
They can be great if you actually have enough useful to say one on one but terrible if they end up being repetitive slogs where there's 30 minutes of awkward small talk because most of the main issues have been addressed in the group discussions already.
posted by Candleman at 10:11 AM on January 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by Candleman at 10:11 AM on January 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
Echoing NotMyselfRightNow and misskaz. I meet with my 10-person team each once a week and these meetings are only rescheduled if my own boss creates a conflict for me. This is how we get work done. My direct reports have my undivided attention for 30-60 minutes depending on their role so that they can get whatever they need. They set the agenda; occasionally I have additional things to add but generally this is their time to get in front of me whatever they need to get in front of me: decisions, priorities, guidance, opinions, atta-boys, whatever they need. It's my chance to read them, to get to know them better personally, to connect with them and then find connections between the work that they are all doing to improve productivity or ease roadblocks or things like that. These meetings are sacrosanct to me. They also help a lot with annual reviews (we have a formal process at this job, but it's not a big deal because we have been doing feedback and progress discussions and planning all year long). I'm interrupted way less on a daily basis and also have to deal with less email because they know they have a time when they will get my attention.
I meet with my own boss one on one every other week, and that also is how I get work done. I'm the one who brings the agenda to that meeting, whatever I want him to focus on. And whatever he says in that meeting I take to be his priorities, so I work them in to what my priorities are for my own team. I don't have to interrupt him if it's not urgent, because I know when I'll be able to get in front of him.
posted by peanut_mcgillicuty at 10:32 AM on January 16, 2020
I meet with my own boss one on one every other week, and that also is how I get work done. I'm the one who brings the agenda to that meeting, whatever I want him to focus on. And whatever he says in that meeting I take to be his priorities, so I work them in to what my priorities are for my own team. I don't have to interrupt him if it's not urgent, because I know when I'll be able to get in front of him.
posted by peanut_mcgillicuty at 10:32 AM on January 16, 2020
My office does this. I find these one-on-one meetings of limited usefulness since my supervisor is fairly accessible to me so I am able to bring up issues with him as things come up. Sometimes he is able to alert me to specific departmental-wide issues ahead of our weekly stand-up and go into those in more detail with me, but at the end of the day I'd say biweekly one-on-ones are unnecessary as long as you are available to discuss things as they come up during the rest of the week.
posted by zeusianfog at 10:54 AM on January 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by zeusianfog at 10:54 AM on January 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
I make it more casual. I stop by their offices once a month or so and ask them how things are going. This keeps them from being stressed out about an upcoming meeting, and it keeps a scheduled meeting from getting in their way of working more productively. I put time for this on my OWN calendar to make sure it happens regularly, but not theirs.
If something comes up before then that I want to talk about, I do so right away instead of saving it up.
posted by metasarah at 11:26 AM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
If something comes up before then that I want to talk about, I do so right away instead of saving it up.
posted by metasarah at 11:26 AM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
I work in the nonprofit field, I'm quite senior in my organization but not management.
I have 1:1 meetings every week with my direct boss that I find to be a frustrating waste of time. He wants "updates" of information that either 1) I just shared in our weekly department meeting, 2) he could look up himself in our CRM, 3) are issues that I have explained in emails to him previously. Meanwhile, throughout the week he'll feel free to ping me ad hoc with random questions or "checking in on how I'm doing with this thing," rather than saving non-urgent questions for our weekly meeting.
posted by desuetude at 12:27 PM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
I have 1:1 meetings every week with my direct boss that I find to be a frustrating waste of time. He wants "updates" of information that either 1) I just shared in our weekly department meeting, 2) he could look up himself in our CRM, 3) are issues that I have explained in emails to him previously. Meanwhile, throughout the week he'll feel free to ping me ad hoc with random questions or "checking in on how I'm doing with this thing," rather than saving non-urgent questions for our weekly meeting.
posted by desuetude at 12:27 PM on January 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
I've been in the position of having them regularly scheduled by my manager and more often than not canceled at two different jobs.
At the first of these my direct report manager had the same coffee habit as most of the team, so we more or less had standups over coffee where a lot of the day-to-day stuff got handled without it even feeling like a work meeting (although that was 80% what he was doing, while the remaining 20% was him addressing his own coffee needs). He still had a weekly one-on-one for each of his direct reports on his calendar, but they were so often canceled for other things that we ended up having actual one-on-one meetings every four to six weeks. Even those were usually brief.
At the more recent job my direct report manager tried to schedule regular blocks, but those were invariably preempted. Instead what usually happened was that one of us would grab him (or he would grab one of us) when time allowed or an issue was pressing, and then the rest of us would usually get our one-on-one time right after that.
When I last had direct reports of my own in a professional setting I was remote relative to my team. Every time I was in their office for other things I'd try to block out some one-on-one time with each of them. What I've found is that people often won't volunteer that something is wrong, but often they themselves know, so part of my approach was to try to get them to bring it up without my having to guide them there.
My one-on-ones almost always started with "so how's it going?" Sometimes I really did just want to catch up, but being remote put more emphasis on that than you might have if you see your direct reports all the time. Sometimes it was a leading question because I knew how it was going and I needed to fix something, but I wanted to see if they brought it up first. After that I'd ask if they had questions or concerns, ask how specific projects were going and if there were any blockers, and if necessary swing to the performance part of the conversation. It was important to me that people not be surprised by any performance conversation, so the easy way to manage that is to have regular guidance conversations and not just one big "this is everything you're doing wrong." If you can build trust by actively hearing and responding to what your direct reports say in early meetings, they will come in better prepared with questions or complaints that you may (or may not) be able to address.
posted by fedward at 1:08 PM on January 16, 2020
At the first of these my direct report manager had the same coffee habit as most of the team, so we more or less had standups over coffee where a lot of the day-to-day stuff got handled without it even feeling like a work meeting (although that was 80% what he was doing, while the remaining 20% was him addressing his own coffee needs). He still had a weekly one-on-one for each of his direct reports on his calendar, but they were so often canceled for other things that we ended up having actual one-on-one meetings every four to six weeks. Even those were usually brief.
At the more recent job my direct report manager tried to schedule regular blocks, but those were invariably preempted. Instead what usually happened was that one of us would grab him (or he would grab one of us) when time allowed or an issue was pressing, and then the rest of us would usually get our one-on-one time right after that.
When I last had direct reports of my own in a professional setting I was remote relative to my team. Every time I was in their office for other things I'd try to block out some one-on-one time with each of them. What I've found is that people often won't volunteer that something is wrong, but often they themselves know, so part of my approach was to try to get them to bring it up without my having to guide them there.
My one-on-ones almost always started with "so how's it going?" Sometimes I really did just want to catch up, but being remote put more emphasis on that than you might have if you see your direct reports all the time. Sometimes it was a leading question because I knew how it was going and I needed to fix something, but I wanted to see if they brought it up first. After that I'd ask if they had questions or concerns, ask how specific projects were going and if there were any blockers, and if necessary swing to the performance part of the conversation. It was important to me that people not be surprised by any performance conversation, so the easy way to manage that is to have regular guidance conversations and not just one big "this is everything you're doing wrong." If you can build trust by actively hearing and responding to what your direct reports say in early meetings, they will come in better prepared with questions or complaints that you may (or may not) be able to address.
posted by fedward at 1:08 PM on January 16, 2020
I have a 45 minute meeting with my manager once a week on Monday mornings. We have a very strong culture of 1 -on-1s at my work, so people treat them as a priority and I've had them in all roles. Whether they're useful or not depends strongly on the manager. I do like them with my current manager.
I usually use the time to go through projects that I'm working (sometimes with the help Teams Planner). He's usually aware of what I'm working on but it's a time to ask if my priorities align with his, tell him if the timeline for this project is getting behind, roadblocks on this project etc. Sometimes we will agree to backburner a particular project at this time too.
We also spend time going into detail about particular work issues I'm facing. My manager is quite good at keeping track of the details of projects, so he can help at every level from "I'm not getting this information I need from another manager, can you figure out a solution?" to "My EC2 instances keep crashing, do you have any idea what's going on?". We will often use the time to draw up a detailed project plan, or work through the technical details of a model.
Sometimes we talk about my development or particular opportunities I'm keen on taking.
And if there's nothing more to talk about, I feel free to end the meeting early. It's understood that the meeting is meant to be useful for me, so there's no obligation to keep talking for 45 minutes.
posted by peacheater at 1:14 PM on January 16, 2020
I usually use the time to go through projects that I'm working (sometimes with the help Teams Planner). He's usually aware of what I'm working on but it's a time to ask if my priorities align with his, tell him if the timeline for this project is getting behind, roadblocks on this project etc. Sometimes we will agree to backburner a particular project at this time too.
We also spend time going into detail about particular work issues I'm facing. My manager is quite good at keeping track of the details of projects, so he can help at every level from "I'm not getting this information I need from another manager, can you figure out a solution?" to "My EC2 instances keep crashing, do you have any idea what's going on?". We will often use the time to draw up a detailed project plan, or work through the technical details of a model.
Sometimes we talk about my development or particular opportunities I'm keen on taking.
And if there's nothing more to talk about, I feel free to end the meeting early. It's understood that the meeting is meant to be useful for me, so there's no obligation to keep talking for 45 minutes.
posted by peacheater at 1:14 PM on January 16, 2020
How scheduled is everyone? I'm fine with doing these ad hoc if my manager is reasonably available - I tend to save up a few non-urgent things for a convenient time.
Since you're new to the role, you could schedule the first round as one offs to help you settle in and then schedule additional / recurring meetings once you see how the first batch go.
posted by momus_window at 1:55 PM on January 16, 2020
Since you're new to the role, you could schedule the first round as one offs to help you settle in and then schedule additional / recurring meetings once you see how the first batch go.
posted by momus_window at 1:55 PM on January 16, 2020
One-on-ones at my company don't have to be strictly work-oriented. My supervisor and I do talk about work, including my career direction, ideas for the department, etc. But we also talk about personal stuff (which we sometimes do during slack moments during the regular workday, too...). Stuff like movies, books, past careers, how's the family, etc. That depends on your relationship with your boss, of course.
Anyway, sometimes they're kinda useless, sometimes they're very helpful. Since I get along well with my supe, it's okay, on the whole, and I definitely look forward to my one-on-ones.
posted by lhauser at 8:50 PM on January 16, 2020
Anyway, sometimes they're kinda useless, sometimes they're very helpful. Since I get along well with my supe, it's okay, on the whole, and I definitely look forward to my one-on-ones.
posted by lhauser at 8:50 PM on January 16, 2020
Since you are a newly-minted manager (congratulations!), you may find the manager-tools podcast/website/book useful. They are fairly prescriptive, but IIRC, they go into a fair bit of detail as to the thinking behind their prescriptions.
And, like others have said, schedule 1:1s at a time convenient for you and your employee and don't reschedule without a really good reason.
I send my manager an agenda of what I want to discuss sometime 1-24 hours before our 1:1 -- it helps me remember to cover everything important and was super-useful when I had a 30 min 1:1 every other week.
posted by elmay at 9:22 AM on January 17, 2020
And, like others have said, schedule 1:1s at a time convenient for you and your employee and don't reschedule without a really good reason.
I send my manager an agenda of what I want to discuss sometime 1-24 hours before our 1:1 -- it helps me remember to cover everything important and was super-useful when I had a 30 min 1:1 every other week.
posted by elmay at 9:22 AM on January 17, 2020
I think the job I work at is very different from yours, but I have daily conversations (not scheduled meetings) with my managers, and I find them helpful. Our workplace is stressful and demands a lot of flexibility, so it's helpful to have someone to help me set my priorities for the day's work. The meetings we have with the whole team are pretty useless in comparison because I'm not getting feedback about my specific workload, and my workload is different from that of the rest of the team.
posted by the liquid oxygen at 2:04 PM on January 18, 2020
posted by the liquid oxygen at 2:04 PM on January 18, 2020
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 6:55 AM on January 16, 2020 [1 favorite]