One-on-ones are one of the greatest opportunities managers have to build rapport with their team, and keep employees focused, productive and engaged. They’re also a great time to give and receive feedback in an environment where employees can feel more comfortable and safe to do so. This is when managers can learn about employee goals, interests and help employees to pursue them. This is also when a manager can get to know about hidden roadblocks and work with employees to remove the impediment. It’s important to remember that one-on-ones are about employees and what they need, not about managers, so status updates should be avoided. However, for some employees it is easier to have status update as a part of their one-on-one, in this case do not avoid it.
One-on-one should be carried as a normal conversation, about the work employees are doing, their role, and outlook on the organization. Personal talks are also encouraged; this is how you build true rapport and connection on a personal level. It is much easier to hear the truth about tough things once you establish trusted relationship. It is important to remember transparency, logic, and respect rules. One-on-ones are a great tool to understand employee engagement. It shouldn’t be done as a survey, but rather understood based on verbal and non-verbal signals you get through your conversation.
Start one-on-ones as weekly meetings with direct reports. In most of the cases you can switch to bi-weekly in 2-3 months. They usually start as 30 min talks, but later, once everything is running at a cruising speed and the relationship is established, the meetings may be reduced to 20 min. Managers with multiple levels of reports may choose to schedule “skip-the-level” one-on-ones, which are 30 min talks once in 2-4 months period.
There are multiple ways to run one-on-ones. The most efficient way is when one-on-one has two parts: employee’s talk, manager’s talk. One-on-one should always start with an employee talking. Remember, this is about an employee, not a manager. Since the very first one-on-one manager needs to understand employee goals and interests. Remember, one of the reasons to have one-on-ones is to help employees in their career growth. It is also important to make sure you don’t miss the meetings and follow up on action items. In some cases, e.g., for new employees, you can use the following four questions to guide them through the conversation:
- What excites you the most?
- What concerns you the most?
- How I can help you?
- How you can help me
One-on-one meeting invitation may look like this:
I wanted to schedule a one-on-one with you on a regular basis. This meeting is about YOU. So, the first part is always for your agenda – anything you want to tell me about anything. What excites you the most, what concerns you the most, your work, your family, your challenges, your career, our working together. The last part is for me. We’ll probably talk about projects you and I are working on, stuff I need from you, feedback, and things I’ve heard from up above. We’ll also talk about your career, training, development, opportunities, or anything else you may need.
I want to make sure you have all support in your work and career development, and I am dedicated to doing it in a transparent, logical, and respectful way. Last but not least, it will be a private conversation – just you and me.
Thank you, and I am looking forward to our chats!
This one-on-one invitation is done based on a much more elaborative one provided by manager-tools.com, explaining the reasoning for a one-on-one in detail. Another great article about setting up one-on-one meetings goals can be found here.
Truth be told… while one-on-one meetings are about employees, they are arguably more important for managers. This is a manager’s way to do a pulse check on a team that is not only limited to the work environment, but goes beyond the office into an employees’ regular life.
