That’s an anti pattern of management - the 1-1 shouldn’t be a status update. There are times you want to brief your boss on things that are important to them, but if you’re just going over your tickets, that’s a waste of time (unless you’re using that time to get technical guidance on your tickets).
There are lots of lousy managers out there, and you can’t control that - but you can set the agenda of your 1-1 yourself if they don’t have one. It’s your 45 minutes with the person who signs your checks, use it to your advantage.
Search the net for questions / topics to manage up in 1-1s.
I often ask my manager for feedback, ask about expectations for promotion, career opportunities, ask advice on problems I have, ask how I can get my thing prioritized, brief her on something I think she should be aware of and what I need from her, etc.
Don’t let your manager turn your 45 minutes into a waste of time.
I lead teams of Data Engineers, Data Scientists, and Platform Engineers. My direct reports drive their 1:1s; from the need to have them in the first place to the agenda when we do.
We have standups for our team as well as the larger team and we are in constant contact with one another throughout each day via IM. Why would we need to repeat the same shit in a 1:1?
I consider their 1:1s THEIR meeting. If they want it, I'm there; if they don't and want to work, great.
As such, we almost never have 1:1s and my team continually leads the organization w/the highest overall as well as manager satisfaction. It's been this way at each and every company I've worked for and is likely why all but one inherited direct report has worked with me at multiple companies before.
Interesting thought, I had never considered cancelling if they don’t have anything. Thanks for that.
My thought was always, “I want to give everyone that time no matter what, and if they don’t have anything, then I go to a list of questions I have for every 1-1 if we have time. Stuff like, “how are you feeling with ${latest_company_happenings}?” or “how do you think the team is doing?” or “are you interested in the work these days, or burnt out?” or ask them about some problem I’m trying to solve for the team and how they’d approach it.
Empowerment of your team is the single most impactful thing you can do for them. This is one small way of making them feel that they truly have autonomy.
This is such good common sense that it’s foreign to so many people.
The 1:1 is great when needed. It’s a waste of time if everyone is already communicating everything. The most efficient teams communicate effectively without having to force it into recurring, pre-determined time slots. Topics like performance reviews and career progression are better discussed in quarterly meetings dedicated to that topic, not a weekly time slot with a fluid agenda.
I realize I’m different than many leaders out there; I came up through the ranks and do everything the way I wished it had been rather than the way it was.
As such, I’m entirely open to any and all feedback from my team. I certainly wouldn’t be offended if you just asked; I’d do my best to accommodate it.
Worst that happens is they get silently offended, while being political to you at the same time and secretly undermine your performance reviews during calibration meetings without you even knowing or just not standing up for you that much during this time will be enough due to stack ranking etc.
I have had multiple managers and the thing is I wouldn't expect a truly honest answer from my manager ever, so to me it is also just all performative ritual that I have to go through and would rather avoid. So it does feel like waste of time to me. And I also feel like I have to be careful, because honesty has most of the time just yielded me useless work in the long term. It is easier to pretend everything is good, than to point out issues as it will i variably lead to a rabbit hole of nonsensical work.
> Search the net for questions / topics to manage up in 1-1s.
This is why so many people find themselves in performative 1 on 1s: It's assumed that the time must be spent, so managers and reports alike start searching for things to fill up that time.
The best 1 on 1 formats I've had were quick and to the point. We cancelled or ended early if there was nothing to discuss that hadn't already been discussed.
The worst were a game of finding things to talk about for 50 minutes because some manager read a few management books and decided they must fill up the time to bond with employees. So we'd go through silly questions from lists from books or do bonding exercises while I had to pretend to smile and enjoy it.
It is totally acceptable to use a list of questions to give you ideas for what to talk about. You might learn something you didn’t know if you didn’t ask.
For example, most managers aren’t having “career” convos with their people regularly. It’s fine to use a question bank if it helps you kick this convo off and get to the heart of the matter.
If your 1-1s have been performative, I guess shame on either the manager, you, or both.
If you’re scheduling meetings without an idea of what to talk about, that’s a problem.
Looking up ideas to discuss with your manager is a good idea. If you are being scheduled for time slots and have to search for ideas to fill it every week, that’s a symptom of a broken meeting that should be reduced in time, frequency, or both.
> I guess shame on either the manager, you, or both.
This culture of shaming people who aren’t doing the performative thing of filling up the meeting time is why so many of us are so tired of this rigid 1:1 dogma. Business and communication practices should meet the team’s needs, not be a game of following steps you found on the Internet about what to talk about in meetings.
Schedule meetings when communication is needed. Stop wasting everyone’s time by searching the internet for conversation ideas for arbitrary meetings.
There are lots of lousy managers out there, and you can’t control that - but you can set the agenda of your 1-1 yourself if they don’t have one. It’s your 45 minutes with the person who signs your checks, use it to your advantage.
Search the net for questions / topics to manage up in 1-1s.
I often ask my manager for feedback, ask about expectations for promotion, career opportunities, ask advice on problems I have, ask how I can get my thing prioritized, brief her on something I think she should be aware of and what I need from her, etc.
Don’t let your manager turn your 45 minutes into a waste of time.