Are your one-to-one’s with your team members moving the needle forward, or just a waste of time?

Effective one-to-one’s can be a game changer and is one of the best tools in the Leadership toolkit if you leverage them correctly. It all comes down to the manager mindset. What are you trying to get out of your one-to-one meetings? Remember, the one-to-one is really an opportunity to continue to build a strong relationship with your team. It’s also an opportunity to coach, mentor, instruct, or train.

The one-to-one is an opportunity for you and the team member to:

connect on pressing items;
talk through strategy;
brainstorm;
find solutions;
provide guidance on a pathway forward.

What we see today are one-to-one’s where two people show up, both unprepared. The meeting is set up for an hour, and there's no progress. Nobody gets anywhere and by the end of the meeting, you realize there's still a ton of work in front of you and email seems to be the best way to communicate and get work done. This is because one-to-one’s can feel awkward if you don't have a strong relationship with the person sitting across from you.

How do we make effective one to ones?
How do we leverage our one to ones to create efficiency?
How do we create productive one-to-one’s that result in furthering the development of your team member?
How do we get the best performance from our team by leveraging our one-to-one’s?

To address the above concerns, there needs to be a clear objective (purpose) and agenda for your meeting. Even if you have a recurring meeting setup, with an agenda, ask yourself:

What do I want to accomplish today?

Why am I meeting with this team member?
What pressing topics do we need to cover?
How has their performance been and do I need to address it during this meeting?

Instead of sending emails to your team members, create a log of topics you want to cover and save them for your one-on-one. There will be times where an email is simply easier, or faster, depending on the next time you meet. Where possible, try and consolidate your topics in preparation for your meeting. Giving you the opportunity to have a live productive conversation, removing ambiguity and lag in response time.

How do you get started with setting up your regular cadence of one-on-one sessions?

Before my new series of meetings start with my team, I ask my team members a series of questions, to understand their meeting preference and expectations. I ask them the same questions every year. Why? Because things change, and people identify new opportunities. The old way might not be working for them anymore. We need to adapt. We need to amend.

The questions I ask are:

Is the timing of the meeting still suitable?
Is an hour enough?
Is it too much?
Is the frequency of the meeting enough?
What expectations do you have of the meeting?
What are they expecting to get out of the meeting?

Once I have their responses, then I take some time to provide them with my expectations of the meeting. Afterall, this meeting is for them. It’s not about the agenda I have, but an opportunity for them to manage up, bring critical updates forward. It provides me with the opportunity to connect with them on a deeper level, getting to know them, coaching and mentoring them where needed or where they prefer.

At this point, you’ve identified that your one-on-one meeting can be leveraged to discuss multiple pressing topics, allowing you to consolidate (creating efficiency) and discuss performance or other critical topics. You’ve identified a cadence and a timeframe for the meeting, while understanding your team’s expectations and setting your own expectations for the meeting. Now, create the agenda and setup the series.

Remember, this is their meeting, as the Leader you need to identify how to maximize the time you have with them. There are several reoccurring topics that you can have on the agenda, but it's not limited to only those topics. These are just the recurring topics you want to connect on. If you really want to move the needle forward in your one-on-one sessions, add 4-5 blanket topics you’d like your team member to cover. Make sure you set proper expectations that these topics can vary depending on their needs/objective for the meeting, and the critical topics you may want to cover.

Sample topics may include:

Projects
Goals
Performance
Development
1 win from this week
A challenge they are having a hard time solving

Lastly, the actual one-on-one meeting.

You’ve put in the time and effort to get to this point, don’t revert back to what’s comfortable. Be prepared for your meeting. Open a notebook, jot down topics that come up leading up to your meeting. The day before the meeting, review the list of topics you have and prioritize what you want to connect on.

When you’re in the meeting, take a moment to revisit the agenda, get your team members feedback on their objective for the meeting and what topics they want to run through. Before jumping in, highlight the topics you have noted on your end. You may have overlapping topics (this is good!), you may discover right away, you’ll need another meeting later in the week to get through all of the topics (that’s ok too). Take a moment to decide what topics are most crucial. Then, take another moment to book the next meeting so it’s already in the calendar.

Now, dive into the topics your team member has prepared for the meeting. Leverage your active-listening skills. Take notes as they speak, so you remember the critical points they are raising. Before responding, make sure you understand their point of view. Again, before responding, take a moment to identify whether this is a training, instructing, coaching or mentoring moment. Then proceed with your feedback.

The one-to-one meetings are the gateway for truly navigating various elements of chaos that your team member is experiencing. If done correctly and effectively, you can cover several critical topics, reduce the amount of work being done over email, and build a stronger relationship with your team.

THE MANAGER TOOLKIT