8 ms·

How Regular One-On-One Meetings Saved Our Company Culture

74 points by AliCollins 11y ago

xyzzy4 11y ago
One on ones can also screw over employees if they say the wrong thing. Ever notice how management usually wants regular one on ones, but employees don't? They damage the quality of life for the employee because they must have a risky conversation every two weeks. Reputations can take months or years to create, but only minutes to destroy. Many engineers just want to get work done instead of having politically correct conversations to prevent the loss of future bonuses or promotions.
- infecto 11y ago
  I can only speak from and engineers view but my hope is that I have a good enough relationship with my manager that we can have an open dialogue. You should also have pretty wide berth in what you can say, even if the complaints or comments are unjustified, sometimes people need to vent. If I was scared to vent to my manager I would be looking for a new job.
  - xyzzy4 11y ago
    Many managers could interpret it as a bad attitude or lack of motivation. As an engineer, I don't like having a financially risky conversation every week or two weeks. There's too many variables and ways to screw up.
    - ogreveins 11y ago
      Being in that kind of environment is stressful. If you can't trust the person above you to have your back you're going it alone. I hate working in places you have to feel unreasonably guarded.
      - vonmoltke 11y ago
        Isn't this the norm outside of the Silicon Valley bubble? Maybe everyone I know (including myself) all just happen to have worked for shitty companies all our careers, but I don't know of any company where I would be comfortable "venting" to my manager.
        jevanish 11y ago
        This is probably why: - Only 30% of employees are engaged - 50% of employees have left a job to get away from a manager - 25% of Millennials plan to quit their job in the next year. Unfortunately, HR is who watches over these issues and are totally disconnected from the root problem (bad management issues). They focus on compliance, lawsuits, and stability. Usually their org is small too, so they have no idea what it's like to have 10 direct reports and constant pressure to ship.
    - eropple 11y ago
      I think it depends on where you are and what the market looks like. The only time I felt at all hesitant about shooting straight with my manager was my first job out of college when I didn't know any better. In every subsequent job, I had no fear of unemployment, and without that fear 1:1's became a very enjoyable experience. I could be honest, and that begets honesty in return, and when I was managing people I paid that forward.
      - ryandrake 11y ago
        You know what puts the fear of unemployment into you? A sudden bout of unexpected unemployment.
        eropple 11y ago
        Been there. I was your-services-are-no-longer-required at a job in 2013; that's what precipitated my career pivot into devops/platform infrastructure. I was out of work for about eight weeks, five of which were by choice (and my new company paid me a significant bonus to start that early). That said, yes, the notion of "hey, I could get fired for this" did sometimes enter my head afterwards, but I never feared it, because I knew I had options.
  - twoquestions 11y ago
    In all seriousness, what do you do that you're so secure with your manager that you have no fear of getting fired for saying or implying the wrong thing? Every place I've ever worked at groans at the expense of people, and will use every means available to reduce that cost.
    - potatolicious 11y ago
      It seems we've had very different professional experiences (not a dig at you, seriously). Most of the places I've worked I have never felt like I needed to bite my tongue, and the couple places where I did, I burned out of quickly because they were such toxic environments. I'm secure with my manager because the culture of the workplace isn't toxic, and we have aligned goals, and so the 1-on-1 meetings are a good place to discuss issues. We all want to ship product, and so bringing up things that might compromise that shared goal is important. That said, I have a particular bit of privilege - I have no children or family to support. My finances are excellent and I can support a very long period of unemployment if needed, and I work in a niche that is in-demand where I'd be able to have a new job in the order of hours or days if I were unceremoniously fired. I also keep my professional networks up to date and I interview well. All of these combine such that I'm basically never stressed about getting fired. If they fire me, shrug. They will likely have a rougher time finding my replacement than I will finding a new job.
      - manyxcxi 11y ago
        To add on to this, if what you are saying is constructive, meant to be meaningful/helpful, and is true- then what fears of getting fired should you have? Even if you're just bitching about some thing/person/policy that gets on your nerves- if what you're saying isn't slanderous and is true, why should you fear repercussion? If being candid with your boss means you have to worry about your job, you would probably be happier elsewhere.
  - jevanish 11y ago
    This chart says it all: To be engaged at work you have to have a trusting relationship with your manager... https://getlighthouse.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Gallup-rapport-engagement.png https://getlighthouse.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Ga... (Source: Gallup State of the American summary: https://getlighthouse.com/blog/gallup-employee-engagement-survey-managers/ https://getlighthouse.com/blog/gallup-employee-engagement-su...)
- eitally 11y ago
  Employees often don't want regular 1:1s because their managers suck, not because 1:1s aren't a useful instrument. Even if you consider the primary role of managers (per another active thread today) to be clearing obstacles and empowering doers to get things done, that by itself is an excellent justification for regular, personal meetings. I'm sorry you feel the way you do. You must have been burned in the past, or known people who were. That's too bad, and I hope you voted with your feet and found a better manager to work with.
- s3r3nity 11y ago
  I may be in the minority here, but I love 1x1's both as a manager AND employee. 1) I think fast, direct, and consistently timed feedback is crucial to developing myself professionally. Rather than waiting until the semi-annual performance review where everything can come at once and possibly surprise me (either in a good way or bad,) I'd rather have regular measurements and course corrections as necessary. 2) I also really appreciate 1x1's with mentors to learn about how to get to the next level and/or understand broader context with an outside perspective vs. my direct manager or reports. 3) I can understand your point on saying the "wrong thing" -- certain cultures might be a bit more politically charged than others. I try to find mentors or other "work friends" that allow me to have free-roam discussions without concerns of judgement. Some might say this should be your significant other / non-work friends, but I think someone with context of your company/industry would provide better feedback and challenge you a bit -- rather than just provide positive validation that what you're saying is always right.
  - st3v3r 11y ago
    Mentors are different than managers. Mentors generally do not have direct influence on your career path.
- pjc50 11y ago
  I think if you're that terrified of having a conversation then something is disastrously wrong in your company culture anyway.
  - dbcurtis 11y ago
    I have to second that. If you don't get value out of the 1:1 with your boss, and your boss doesn't get value from you during a 1:1, you need a different boss. I always viewed one of the biggest values of 1:1's is that people on my team could educate me about things I was too distracted/busy to notice or keep up with. It's wickedly hard for a technical manager to both manage and to keep up with the technology the team is using. I always tried to use a part of the 1:1 time to play student and learn whatever my team member thought was important for me to know. Likewise, when managing up during my 1:1 with my higher-level manager, I tried to make sure the most exciting new ideas bubbled up. One of the best way to weed out bad managers once a company reaches a certain scale is a simple two part system: 1) Make it easier to get an internal hiring req than an external one, and oversubscribe the total headcount budget by a few percent purely with internal hiring reqs. (Guarantee hole flow.) 2) Establish an immutable policy that a losing manager can never block a transfer, ever, for more than a couple of weeks of clean-up/hand-off. Bad managers are then easy to spot by the vacuum that surrounds them.
  - st3v3r 11y ago
    That may be true, but it doesn't really change anything. Not everyone has the ability to switch jobs on a whim.
  - kzhahou 11y ago
    That's hyperbole on both sides, both the "terrified" part (implying an employee shaking in fear before their 1-1) and "disastrously wrong" (a sweeping write-off of this multidimensional thing called "culture"). Simple truth is a lot of people don't like them, they induce stress for a number of reasons (such as employees' natural instinct to want to "look good" in front of their bosses), and bad 1-1s are often just another annoyance at work -- not a disaster, just not too useful.
- rifung 11y ago
  I disagree but I don't feel like you deserve to be downvoted for having an opinion that's based off your own experience and also sympathize with you for not having had a chance to work with a manager you feel you can trust. As an employee, I will say I actually really enjoy one on ones! In fact I think I enjoy them much more than my manager does. I feel like it's a time when I, even as a low level employee, can let the manager know about things that he/she isn't able to see because he/she isn't in the trenches anymore. Frankly I'm very lucky because I really like my manager; he's the main reason I joined this company. I feel like if I have personal issues that may interfere with work I can talk to him and he'd understand. Personally I find getting and providing direct feedback is much better than constantly living in fear you're doing something wrong. Plus, sometimes having one on ones can be motivating when your manager tells you about how someone else in the company appreciated your work.
- BurningFrog 11y ago
  One reason employees don't want these conversations is that they have a shitty manager. But it can also be that they're a shitty employee. The chance of "saying the wrong thing" is much bigger if you are in fact the wrong person for the job and/or team.
  - jevanish 11y ago
    This is probably why Netflix gives a "generous severance package" to people that don't work out. Make it easy to remove bad fits, whether it's the manager or employee.
- cookiecaper 11y ago
  I'm disappointed that you're getting downvoted because I think you're touching on something really important, which is that 1:1s, like everything else in corporate life, have an inherently heavy atmosphere to them. The fact that you're cognizant of this shows that you have some experience under your belt. A good manager will do what he can to ease the situation, but the arrangement of the meeting is substantial and can certainly be risky. However, while recognizing some flaws that are basically inherent in contemporary corporate structure, I believe 1:1s are extremely important. I think one of the single biggest problems organizations have is that they don't regularly check-in and explicitly solicit feedback. You get so much valuable intelligence this way, even if you're aware of the atmosphere and the incentives that loom over these meetings. The isolation and lack of data really hurt managerial efforts. This is compounded as you go up the chain. I think that upper management should perform 1:1s all the way down every 3-6 months. This is basically checking middle management's work, something which rarely happens, and it provides the essential pieces of data that get obscured as information travels up the ladder.
  - ryandrake 11y ago
    I'm also disappointed to see the downvotes the parent poster is getting. It certainly adds to the conversation. Most places I've worked, a 1:1 with your boss appearing on your calendar meant you screwed something up, and you need to be very careful to make sure you don't say anything career-limiting.
    - manyxcxi 11y ago
      If one on ones aren't normally scheduled, then seeing one popup is definitely cause for anxiety. If the company or manager sets a regular schedule for them, then it shouldn't be cause for pants shitting- unless of course you royally screwed up at some point in recent history. A long time ago I royally effed up on a project I was working on. It was a Sharepoint project, a deployment went sideways, and I frankly wasn't very good with Sharepoint yet. It lead to some temporary data loss and downtime but I was able to rollback and restore. Anyway, the problems were my fault but my good habits prevented it from being a complete disaster. It was a highly visible fuck up though. I came in to my one on one, for the first time ever, scared that I was at least going to get an ass chewing. My boss took the time straight out of the gate to praise my good habits for saving the day, and trying to figure out how we could've avoided the issues I caused. The way he approached the meeting completely re-sold me on him as a manager and the company I was working for.
- sportanova 11y ago
  Totally agree. Even if you like your manager, there's still a huge risk of saying the wrong thing and being labeled a problem child. I'm worried that 1-1s are becoming the next Agile - just another process used to increase control under the guise of empowerment
  - jevanish 11y ago
    This is why it's important to talk about what to do in them. Bad managers make them status updates and talk about projects. Good ones get into feedback, coaching, fixing problems, growth and development, etc. Coincidentally, this is why I started a company, GetLighthouse.com to tackle this and the general problem of bad people management practices. It's amazing what a little structure, best practices, and automating can do to improve things for a manager and their team.
    - sportanova 11y ago
      Sounds terrible, but good luck! "feedback, coaching, fixing problems, growth and development" are the kinds of things that I definitely don't trust with 90% of companies, so if it becomes standard, we're all be worse off
mc32 11y ago
One on ones are one of those things which don't terminate with satisfaction from both sides. They are necessary but they are unfair. (necessary because of imperfect information). This lack of resolution stems from the power dynamics. The one on ones don't go through a drone (powerless) proxy. They are lower level employee to higher level manager, if not manager, influencer, lead, etc., not someone equal or on a lower rung, so they are inherently asymmetric therefore most employees always (if they care) have to wear a mask and couch things and pretend. On the other hand employees should be flexible enough that things should not become problematic. For the most part people working together should be able to resolve internal team issues. If something needs external influence bring it up for resolution using the channels available. To add, the employee for the most part has to subvert themselves to the manager's style else risk being interpreted incorrectly. To be redundant, one on ones are useful, if the constraints are understood, till trouble arises at which point one on ones become useless vehicles for resolution.
- joshyeager 11y ago
  If the manager-employee relationship is not good, 1:1's do have the problems you described. But the cool thing is that 1:1's can also improve relationships and build trust, which actually resolves those problems over time. This doesn't work if you don't have some amount of trust to begin with. But I've found that over time 1:1's build trust and open communications because the frequent, consistent, small conversations help both parties learn about each other and work through issues together. I do 1:1's as a manager with my employees and also as an employee with my manager, so I've seen this from both sides for the past 5-6 years. I am confident that our 1:1's have been the single biggest factor in the great relationships and high trust that we all have now.
  - mc32 11y ago
    My main concern is that while things are good things go well. A reinforcing feedback loop. But when things aren't going well people tend to recall the odd moments, take out the old notes and rely on "instinct" and interpret innocuous things in a different light.
jdcarter 11y ago
My company seems to think that Scrum stand-ups are a replacement for one-on-one meetings. They're very, very wrong. Coordinating work and keeping the project moving forward is one thing, but like Alex points out here, there's far more to management. Agile methodologies/slack channels/etc. are simply not a replacement for people management. In many companies, the people manager and project manager are the same person, and they generally default to managing the project first. (Squeaky wheel gets the grease, right? And what's squeakier than an executive breathing down your neck?) But when your culture starts dissolving and employees start leaving... well by then it might be too late to get interested in people management. In my group, morale is a big issue, and retention is about to become one--I know of several people with one foot out the door already. I'm not sure management is even aware.
- themodelplumber 11y ago
  If you can, start passing around links to Manager Tools or just drop references to it. It's a podcast where they absolutely hammer leaders on issues like doing one-on-ones (this problem often goes right up to CEO), running meetings well, etc. With any luck management will pick up on it and change while you're still there, but if not--these people will probably be managing other people for the rest of their lives so someone somewhere will probably be grateful.
  - jdcarter 11y ago
    Thanks for the tip, I wasn't aware of Manager Tools before. Found the site, will take some of their podcasts for a spin!
  - dccooper 11y ago
    Product manager here, seconding Manager Tools as invaluable.
- st3v3r 11y ago
  Make sure that if a lot of other people are starting to leave, that you're not last out the door. What usually happens in that case is that everyone else gets pushed to "make up for those that left". Deadlines don't change, but with fewer people, that just means longer hours with no bump in pay.
thefastlane 11y ago
i'd play along, but i wouldn't provide more information than is absolutely necessary to someone who, by definition of their role and mine, does not have my best interests in mind.
- twoquestions 11y ago
  I would also be stressed about giving my superiors tons of reasons (real or imagined) to take me out behind the wood shed and put a (metaphorical) bullet in my head. Having to resell yourself and your work on the regular has go to be stressful.
- manyxcxi 11y ago
  A one on one shouldn't require playing along or a good poker face. Granted, you're the best judge of the type of manager that you're dealing with, but if they're any decent kind of person you should be able to ask them for help or guidance and bring up issues you're encountering. Now, it's true that they may get a sour impression if every meeting is you complaining about this, that, or the other- but this really should be your chance to alert the right person to issues that could be affecting more than just yourself, but the entire team. Your boss may genuinely have no idea of the problems you're facing until you tell them. If you never tell them, you'll have no idea if they could've helped or not, and you may just wind up burned out and leaving the company. Conversely, they may be able to go out and alleviate whatever the issue was and show how much you mean to them or the company.
SyneRyder 11y ago
I loved my one-on-one calls, and I'm someone who really hates phone calls & meetings. For me it was 30 minutes each week where I could bounce ideas about work, my own side projects, life in general, and chat about their work / projects / life too. It was like two friends with a mutual interest in business having a catchup & occasional rant & a laugh. It was fun & left me energized & motivated - hopefully they felt the same. Perhaps one difference is that I was working remote. In the article, they also say "We’re a remote team [...] and we don’t spend all day with each other." If I was on-site & seeing people every day, I probably wouldn't want a 1-on-1 each week either. A 1-on-1 in a manager's office sounds awful. If it must be in person then you should go to a cafe, get a burger or a bubble tea, make it enjoyable! If you feel the conversations have to be politically correct, that it's all about "professional development" (eww), or you sense asymmetric power dynamics... maybe that's a red flag that it's not a job you want to stay in or people you want to work with. It shouldn't feel like that. Life is too short to put up with office politics.
mathattack 11y ago
This seems so obvious, but then I was surprised when I inherited a team that this wasn't happening on. As companies grow, they need to provide regular cadences for communicating. Some of it is group meetings or emails. Some of it is one on one. This is especially true for coaching.
cableshaft 11y ago
I've had really good bosses, but every time a one-on-one comes up, I get nervous. I've been laid off in one-on-one meetings in the past. I've also had to make split decisions without properly evalutating it, like tell my manager who to lay off, before. I'm also not perfect, so every time one of those meetings comes up I start wondering if something I did that wasn't perfect is going to come up and I'm about to get a stern talking to, even though more often than not the one-on-ones go well. If I really had a problem that I wanted a resolution on, I'd knock on my managers door and talk to him when I was ready to talk to him about it. I usually don't bring those things up in one-on-ones, so they haven't been terribly useful to me. So generally, I get really nervous before the meeting, and relax again afterwards. I don't know if I'd get rid of them entirely, but I wish they were less frequent.
- manyxcxi 11y ago
  If they're a normally scheduled meeting it seems odd that you would be so anxious about them. I could totally see the anxiety if they weren't part of a routine, where if one suddenly popped up you'd be wondering what it could mean. But if you always had a meeting on the books every week or couple of weeks, it would seem like it would just be a normal run of the mill check in. Then again, if you weren't working with your boss that frequently or your one on ones were generally most of the relationship you had with them, I could see how they'd cause anxiety. Hopefully you are able to find a cadence with them, or a boss, that eases the anxiety and provides you with connection and value.
brogrammer90 11y ago
Before you become honest, make sure you understand the politics of your team. I worked with a 40 something obese, single, just plain miserable neckbeard who got off on hazing new employees. I mentioned this in the one on one to our manager and the day after, both manager and neckbeard conspired to make my life hell. And they won, I resigned.
- munchbunny 11y ago
  Yup, there's an art to it. You have to make sure your manager is actually on your side first. Good managers are, bad managers pay lip service to the idea. In between there are many well intentioned managers who haven't figured out the skill of encouraging openness.
- peekajew 11y ago
  And when hiring, it's important to avoid hiring folks who think it's appropriate to recount a problem by saying the other person was old, fat, single, and a "miserable neckbeard" before they mention a single word about the problem. That's poisonous behavior, and if you let that sort of cancer into your company, you won't get it out. Attacking behaviors is great, attacking people is garbage.
kzhahou 11y ago
The best places I've worked had 1-on-1 meetings that were only rarely useful, and no daily standups, no scrum, and weekly team meetings where people mostly were trying to stay awake. Those also happened the most productive places I've worked, by far, because we had a ton of on-the-ground collaboration. We were all on the same floor, and we talked all day, looked at each other's code, worked hard, and had fun. The 1-on-1s were a distraction. Every once in a while it was useful, but it could have easily been a monthly thing.
- Grishnakh 11y ago
  1-on-1s are something where it doesn't seem necessary if you don't need it at the moment, but if you do, it's very useful. If everything is going great for you and you have no real issues, then a 1-on-1 meeting with your manager is going to seem like a waste of time. If you have an issue, however, which you don't want to discuss with your group at large, a 1-on-1 is essential. You might think employees should just request a meeting with the manager if this happens, but having a regular 1-1 meeting frequently helps get employees to discuss things they otherwise wouldn't volunteer. Most people don't want to be the one making waves and rocking the boat, but the 1-1 gives them that forum to do so since they're not bothering the manager (the manager is required to spend his time in the 1-1 meeting anyway, so you're not cramping his schedule to talk about your concern). They're not perfect; employees still may be reluctant to bring things up, but a good manager can deal with that.

74 points by AliCollins 11y ago

One on ones can also screw over employees if they say the wrong thing. Ever notice how management usually wants regular one on ones, but employees don't? They damage the quality of life for the employee because they must have a risky conversation every two weeks. Reputations can take months or years to create, but only minutes to destroy. Many engineers just want to get work done instead of having politically correct conversations to prevent the loss of future bonuses or promotions.

infecto 11y ago
I can only speak from and engineers view but my hope is that I have a good enough relationship with my manager that we can have an open dialogue. You should also have pretty wide berth in what you can say, even if the complaints or comments are unjustified, sometimes people need to vent. If I was scared to vent to my manager I would be looking for a new job.
- xyzzy4 11y ago
  Many managers could interpret it as a bad attitude or lack of motivation. As an engineer, I don't like having a financially risky conversation every week or two weeks. There's too many variables and ways to screw up.
  - ogreveins 11y ago
    Being in that kind of environment is stressful. If you can't trust the person above you to have your back you're going it alone. I hate working in places you have to feel unreasonably guarded.
    - vonmoltke 11y ago
      Isn't this the norm outside of the Silicon Valley bubble? Maybe everyone I know (including myself) all just happen to have worked for shitty companies all our careers, but I don't know of any company where I would be comfortable "venting" to my manager.
      - jevanish 11y ago
        This is probably why: - Only 30% of employees are engaged - 50% of employees have left a job to get away from a manager - 25% of Millennials plan to quit their job in the next year. Unfortunately, HR is who watches over these issues and are totally disconnected from the root problem (bad management issues). They focus on compliance, lawsuits, and stability. Usually their org is small too, so they have no idea what it's like to have 10 direct reports and constant pressure to ship.
  - eropple 11y ago
    I think it depends on where you are and what the market looks like. The only time I felt at all hesitant about shooting straight with my manager was my first job out of college when I didn't know any better. In every subsequent job, I had no fear of unemployment, and without that fear 1:1's became a very enjoyable experience. I could be honest, and that begets honesty in return, and when I was managing people I paid that forward.
    - ryandrake 11y ago
      You know what puts the fear of unemployment into you? A sudden bout of unexpected unemployment.
      - eropple 11y ago
        Been there. I was your-services-are-no-longer-required at a job in 2013; that's what precipitated my career pivot into devops/platform infrastructure. I was out of work for about eight weeks, five of which were by choice (and my new company paid me a significant bonus to start that early). That said, yes, the notion of "hey, I could get fired for this" did sometimes enter my head afterwards, but I never feared it, because I knew I had options.
- twoquestions 11y ago
  In all seriousness, what do you do that you're so secure with your manager that you have no fear of getting fired for saying or implying the wrong thing? Every place I've ever worked at groans at the expense of people, and will use every means available to reduce that cost.
  - potatolicious 11y ago
    It seems we've had very different professional experiences (not a dig at you, seriously). Most of the places I've worked I have never felt like I needed to bite my tongue, and the couple places where I did, I burned out of quickly because they were such toxic environments. I'm secure with my manager because the culture of the workplace isn't toxic, and we have aligned goals, and so the 1-on-1 meetings are a good place to discuss issues. We all want to ship product, and so bringing up things that might compromise that shared goal is important. That said, I have a particular bit of privilege - I have no children or family to support. My finances are excellent and I can support a very long period of unemployment if needed, and I work in a niche that is in-demand where I'd be able to have a new job in the order of hours or days if I were unceremoniously fired. I also keep my professional networks up to date and I interview well. All of these combine such that I'm basically never stressed about getting fired. If they fire me, shrug. They will likely have a rougher time finding my replacement than I will finding a new job.
    - manyxcxi 11y ago
      To add on to this, if what you are saying is constructive, meant to be meaningful/helpful, and is true- then what fears of getting fired should you have? Even if you're just bitching about some thing/person/policy that gets on your nerves- if what you're saying isn't slanderous and is true, why should you fear repercussion? If being candid with your boss means you have to worry about your job, you would probably be happier elsewhere.
- jevanish 11y ago
  This chart says it all: To be engaged at work you have to have a trusting relationship with your manager... https://getlighthouse.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Gallup-rapport-engagement.png https://getlighthouse.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Ga... (Source: Gallup State of the American summary: https://getlighthouse.com/blog/gallup-employee-engagement-survey-managers/ https://getlighthouse.com/blog/gallup-employee-engagement-su...)
eitally 11y ago
Employees often don't want regular 1:1s because their managers suck, not because 1:1s aren't a useful instrument. Even if you consider the primary role of managers (per another active thread today) to be clearing obstacles and empowering doers to get things done, that by itself is an excellent justification for regular, personal meetings. I'm sorry you feel the way you do. You must have been burned in the past, or known people who were. That's too bad, and I hope you voted with your feet and found a better manager to work with.
s3r3nity 11y ago
I may be in the minority here, but I love 1x1's both as a manager AND employee. 1) I think fast, direct, and consistently timed feedback is crucial to developing myself professionally. Rather than waiting until the semi-annual performance review where everything can come at once and possibly surprise me (either in a good way or bad,) I'd rather have regular measurements and course corrections as necessary. 2) I also really appreciate 1x1's with mentors to learn about how to get to the next level and/or understand broader context with an outside perspective vs. my direct manager or reports. 3) I can understand your point on saying the "wrong thing" -- certain cultures might be a bit more politically charged than others. I try to find mentors or other "work friends" that allow me to have free-roam discussions without concerns of judgement. Some might say this should be your significant other / non-work friends, but I think someone with context of your company/industry would provide better feedback and challenge you a bit -- rather than just provide positive validation that what you're saying is always right.
- st3v3r 11y ago
  Mentors are different than managers. Mentors generally do not have direct influence on your career path.
pjc50 11y ago
I think if you're that terrified of having a conversation then something is disastrously wrong in your company culture anyway.
- dbcurtis 11y ago
  I have to second that. If you don't get value out of the 1:1 with your boss, and your boss doesn't get value from you during a 1:1, you need a different boss. I always viewed one of the biggest values of 1:1's is that people on my team could educate me about things I was too distracted/busy to notice or keep up with. It's wickedly hard for a technical manager to both manage and to keep up with the technology the team is using. I always tried to use a part of the 1:1 time to play student and learn whatever my team member thought was important for me to know. Likewise, when managing up during my 1:1 with my higher-level manager, I tried to make sure the most exciting new ideas bubbled up. One of the best way to weed out bad managers once a company reaches a certain scale is a simple two part system: 1) Make it easier to get an internal hiring req than an external one, and oversubscribe the total headcount budget by a few percent purely with internal hiring reqs. (Guarantee hole flow.) 2) Establish an immutable policy that a losing manager can never block a transfer, ever, for more than a couple of weeks of clean-up/hand-off. Bad managers are then easy to spot by the vacuum that surrounds them.
- st3v3r 11y ago
  That may be true, but it doesn't really change anything. Not everyone has the ability to switch jobs on a whim.
- kzhahou 11y ago
  That's hyperbole on both sides, both the "terrified" part (implying an employee shaking in fear before their 1-1) and "disastrously wrong" (a sweeping write-off of this multidimensional thing called "culture"). Simple truth is a lot of people don't like them, they induce stress for a number of reasons (such as employees' natural instinct to want to "look good" in front of their bosses), and bad 1-1s are often just another annoyance at work -- not a disaster, just not too useful.
rifung 11y ago
I disagree but I don't feel like you deserve to be downvoted for having an opinion that's based off your own experience and also sympathize with you for not having had a chance to work with a manager you feel you can trust. As an employee, I will say I actually really enjoy one on ones! In fact I think I enjoy them much more than my manager does. I feel like it's a time when I, even as a low level employee, can let the manager know about things that he/she isn't able to see because he/she isn't in the trenches anymore. Frankly I'm very lucky because I really like my manager; he's the main reason I joined this company. I feel like if I have personal issues that may interfere with work I can talk to him and he'd understand. Personally I find getting and providing direct feedback is much better than constantly living in fear you're doing something wrong. Plus, sometimes having one on ones can be motivating when your manager tells you about how someone else in the company appreciated your work.
BurningFrog 11y ago
One reason employees don't want these conversations is that they have a shitty manager. But it can also be that they're a shitty employee. The chance of "saying the wrong thing" is much bigger if you are in fact the wrong person for the job and/or team.
- jevanish 11y ago
  This is probably why Netflix gives a "generous severance package" to people that don't work out. Make it easy to remove bad fits, whether it's the manager or employee.
cookiecaper 11y ago
I'm disappointed that you're getting downvoted because I think you're touching on something really important, which is that 1:1s, like everything else in corporate life, have an inherently heavy atmosphere to them. The fact that you're cognizant of this shows that you have some experience under your belt. A good manager will do what he can to ease the situation, but the arrangement of the meeting is substantial and can certainly be risky. However, while recognizing some flaws that are basically inherent in contemporary corporate structure, I believe 1:1s are extremely important. I think one of the single biggest problems organizations have is that they don't regularly check-in and explicitly solicit feedback. You get so much valuable intelligence this way, even if you're aware of the atmosphere and the incentives that loom over these meetings. The isolation and lack of data really hurt managerial efforts. This is compounded as you go up the chain. I think that upper management should perform 1:1s all the way down every 3-6 months. This is basically checking middle management's work, something which rarely happens, and it provides the essential pieces of data that get obscured as information travels up the ladder.
- ryandrake 11y ago
  I'm also disappointed to see the downvotes the parent poster is getting. It certainly adds to the conversation. Most places I've worked, a 1:1 with your boss appearing on your calendar meant you screwed something up, and you need to be very careful to make sure you don't say anything career-limiting.
  - manyxcxi 11y ago
    If one on ones aren't normally scheduled, then seeing one popup is definitely cause for anxiety. If the company or manager sets a regular schedule for them, then it shouldn't be cause for pants shitting- unless of course you royally screwed up at some point in recent history. A long time ago I royally effed up on a project I was working on. It was a Sharepoint project, a deployment went sideways, and I frankly wasn't very good with Sharepoint yet. It lead to some temporary data loss and downtime but I was able to rollback and restore. Anyway, the problems were my fault but my good habits prevented it from being a complete disaster. It was a highly visible fuck up though. I came in to my one on one, for the first time ever, scared that I was at least going to get an ass chewing. My boss took the time straight out of the gate to praise my good habits for saving the day, and trying to figure out how we could've avoided the issues I caused. The way he approached the meeting completely re-sold me on him as a manager and the company I was working for.
sportanova 11y ago
Totally agree. Even if you like your manager, there's still a huge risk of saying the wrong thing and being labeled a problem child. I'm worried that 1-1s are becoming the next Agile - just another process used to increase control under the guise of empowerment
- jevanish 11y ago
  This is why it's important to talk about what to do in them. Bad managers make them status updates and talk about projects. Good ones get into feedback, coaching, fixing problems, growth and development, etc. Coincidentally, this is why I started a company, GetLighthouse.com to tackle this and the general problem of bad people management practices. It's amazing what a little structure, best practices, and automating can do to improve things for a manager and their team.
  - sportanova 11y ago
    Sounds terrible, but good luck! "feedback, coaching, fixing problems, growth and development" are the kinds of things that I definitely don't trust with 90% of companies, so if it becomes standard, we're all be worse off

mc32 11y ago

One on ones are one of those things which don't terminate with satisfaction from both sides. They are necessary but they are unfair. (necessary because of imperfect information). This lack of resolution stems from the power dynamics. The one on ones don't go through a drone (powerless) proxy. They are lower level employee to higher level manager, if not manager, influencer, lead, etc., not someone equal or on a lower rung, so they are inherently asymmetric therefore most employees always (if they care) have to wear a mask and couch things and pretend. On the other hand employees should be flexible enough that things should not become problematic. For the most part people working together should be able to resolve internal team issues. If something needs external influence bring it up for resolution using the channels available. To add, the employee for the most part has to subvert themselves to the manager's style else risk being interpreted incorrectly. To be redundant, one on ones are useful, if the constraints are understood, till trouble arises at which point one on ones become useless vehicles for resolution.

joshyeager 11y ago
If the manager-employee relationship is not good, 1:1's do have the problems you described. But the cool thing is that 1:1's can also improve relationships and build trust, which actually resolves those problems over time. This doesn't work if you don't have some amount of trust to begin with. But I've found that over time 1:1's build trust and open communications because the frequent, consistent, small conversations help both parties learn about each other and work through issues together. I do 1:1's as a manager with my employees and also as an employee with my manager, so I've seen this from both sides for the past 5-6 years. I am confident that our 1:1's have been the single biggest factor in the great relationships and high trust that we all have now.
- mc32 11y ago
  My main concern is that while things are good things go well. A reinforcing feedback loop. But when things aren't going well people tend to recall the odd moments, take out the old notes and rely on "instinct" and interpret innocuous things in a different light.

jdcarter 11y ago

My company seems to think that Scrum stand-ups are a replacement for one-on-one meetings. They're very, very wrong. Coordinating work and keeping the project moving forward is one thing, but like Alex points out here, there's far more to management. Agile methodologies/slack channels/etc. are simply not a replacement for people management. In many companies, the people manager and project manager are the same person, and they generally default to managing the project first. (Squeaky wheel gets the grease, right? And what's squeakier than an executive breathing down your neck?) But when your culture starts dissolving and employees start leaving... well by then it might be too late to get interested in people management. In my group, morale is a big issue, and retention is about to become one--I know of several people with one foot out the door already. I'm not sure management is even aware.

themodelplumber 11y ago
If you can, start passing around links to Manager Tools or just drop references to it. It's a podcast where they absolutely hammer leaders on issues like doing one-on-ones (this problem often goes right up to CEO), running meetings well, etc. With any luck management will pick up on it and change while you're still there, but if not--these people will probably be managing other people for the rest of their lives so someone somewhere will probably be grateful.
- jdcarter 11y ago
  Thanks for the tip, I wasn't aware of Manager Tools before. Found the site, will take some of their podcasts for a spin!
- dccooper 11y ago
  Product manager here, seconding Manager Tools as invaluable.
st3v3r 11y ago
Make sure that if a lot of other people are starting to leave, that you're not last out the door. What usually happens in that case is that everyone else gets pushed to "make up for those that left". Deadlines don't change, but with fewer people, that just means longer hours with no bump in pay.

thefastlane 11y ago

i'd play along, but i wouldn't provide more information than is absolutely necessary to someone who, by definition of their role and mine, does not have my best interests in mind.

twoquestions 11y ago
I would also be stressed about giving my superiors tons of reasons (real or imagined) to take me out behind the wood shed and put a (metaphorical) bullet in my head. Having to resell yourself and your work on the regular has go to be stressful.
manyxcxi 11y ago
A one on one shouldn't require playing along or a good poker face. Granted, you're the best judge of the type of manager that you're dealing with, but if they're any decent kind of person you should be able to ask them for help or guidance and bring up issues you're encountering. Now, it's true that they may get a sour impression if every meeting is you complaining about this, that, or the other- but this really should be your chance to alert the right person to issues that could be affecting more than just yourself, but the entire team. Your boss may genuinely have no idea of the problems you're facing until you tell them. If you never tell them, you'll have no idea if they could've helped or not, and you may just wind up burned out and leaving the company. Conversely, they may be able to go out and alleviate whatever the issue was and show how much you mean to them or the company.

SyneRyder 11y ago

I loved my one-on-one calls, and I'm someone who really hates phone calls & meetings. For me it was 30 minutes each week where I could bounce ideas about work, my own side projects, life in general, and chat about their work / projects / life too. It was like two friends with a mutual interest in business having a catchup & occasional rant & a laugh. It was fun & left me energized & motivated - hopefully they felt the same. Perhaps one difference is that I was working remote. In the article, they also say "We’re a remote team [...] and we don’t spend all day with each other." If I was on-site & seeing people every day, I probably wouldn't want a 1-on-1 each week either. A 1-on-1 in a manager's office sounds awful. If it must be in person then you should go to a cafe, get a burger or a bubble tea, make it enjoyable! If you feel the conversations have to be politically correct, that it's all about "professional development" (eww), or you sense asymmetric power dynamics... maybe that's a red flag that it's not a job you want to stay in or people you want to work with. It shouldn't feel like that. Life is too short to put up with office politics.

mathattack 11y ago

This seems so obvious, but then I was surprised when I inherited a team that this wasn't happening on. As companies grow, they need to provide regular cadences for communicating. Some of it is group meetings or emails. Some of it is one on one. This is especially true for coaching.

cableshaft 11y ago

I've had really good bosses, but every time a one-on-one comes up, I get nervous. I've been laid off in one-on-one meetings in the past. I've also had to make split decisions without properly evalutating it, like tell my manager who to lay off, before. I'm also not perfect, so every time one of those meetings comes up I start wondering if something I did that wasn't perfect is going to come up and I'm about to get a stern talking to, even though more often than not the one-on-ones go well. If I really had a problem that I wanted a resolution on, I'd knock on my managers door and talk to him when I was ready to talk to him about it. I usually don't bring those things up in one-on-ones, so they haven't been terribly useful to me. So generally, I get really nervous before the meeting, and relax again afterwards. I don't know if I'd get rid of them entirely, but I wish they were less frequent.

manyxcxi 11y ago
If they're a normally scheduled meeting it seems odd that you would be so anxious about them. I could totally see the anxiety if they weren't part of a routine, where if one suddenly popped up you'd be wondering what it could mean. But if you always had a meeting on the books every week or couple of weeks, it would seem like it would just be a normal run of the mill check in. Then again, if you weren't working with your boss that frequently or your one on ones were generally most of the relationship you had with them, I could see how they'd cause anxiety. Hopefully you are able to find a cadence with them, or a boss, that eases the anxiety and provides you with connection and value.

brogrammer90 11y ago

Before you become honest, make sure you understand the politics of your team. I worked with a 40 something obese, single, just plain miserable neckbeard who got off on hazing new employees. I mentioned this in the one on one to our manager and the day after, both manager and neckbeard conspired to make my life hell. And they won, I resigned.

munchbunny 11y ago
Yup, there's an art to it. You have to make sure your manager is actually on your side first. Good managers are, bad managers pay lip service to the idea. In between there are many well intentioned managers who haven't figured out the skill of encouraging openness.
peekajew 11y ago
And when hiring, it's important to avoid hiring folks who think it's appropriate to recount a problem by saying the other person was old, fat, single, and a "miserable neckbeard" before they mention a single word about the problem. That's poisonous behavior, and if you let that sort of cancer into your company, you won't get it out. Attacking behaviors is great, attacking people is garbage.

kzhahou 11y ago

The best places I've worked had 1-on-1 meetings that were only rarely useful, and no daily standups, no scrum, and weekly team meetings where people mostly were trying to stay awake. Those also happened the most productive places I've worked, by far, because we had a ton of on-the-ground collaboration. We were all on the same floor, and we talked all day, looked at each other's code, worked hard, and had fun. The 1-on-1s were a distraction. Every once in a while it was useful, but it could have easily been a monthly thing.

Grishnakh 11y ago
1-on-1s are something where it doesn't seem necessary if you don't need it at the moment, but if you do, it's very useful. If everything is going great for you and you have no real issues, then a 1-on-1 meeting with your manager is going to seem like a waste of time. If you have an issue, however, which you don't want to discuss with your group at large, a 1-on-1 is essential. You might think employees should just request a meeting with the manager if this happens, but having a regular 1-1 meeting frequently helps get employees to discuss things they otherwise wouldn't volunteer. Most people don't want to be the one making waves and rocking the boat, but the 1-1 gives them that forum to do so since they're not bothering the manager (the manager is required to spend his time in the 1-1 meeting anyway, so you're not cramping his schedule to talk about your concern). They're not perfect; employees still may be reluctant to bring things up, but a good manager can deal with that.