How an Anxious Introvert Learned to Love 1:1s With Their Team
And Why My Direct Reports Actually Enjoy Our 1:1s
I'm going to break down how to have effective 1:1s with your direct reports that they will actually look forward to—and that will make you a more effective and confident leader.
I am an introvert who was always anxious to have 1:1s with anyone. Just having them on my calendar for the end of the day made me miserable leading up to it and it killed my productivity. So I became a manager to conquer my fears! On that journey I spent considerable effort learning everything I could, and now I fear 1:1s with nobody.
Over the next few minutes I'll share everything I've learned and I hope it helps you be a more confident leader who has more joyful 1:1s. I genuinely look forward to every single 1:1 on my calendar every week, even if the week is crazy busy (which they usually are). Let’s get going!
I’ve written about 1:1s before, and while it’s not required reading, I am going to skip some of the basic details of setting up and running 1:1s so we can get right to the good stuff!
Prep for your meetings
I do this in two ways.
The first is adding things that come up throughout the week to the agenda. This could be a piece of feedback for your report, useful (but not urgent) information, a thought or insight about their career, an opportunity you want to discuss with them, etc. The more you get to know your report, the more things will pop up during the work week.
The second is taking some time to do 2 minutes of reviewing the agenda. You can take longer, but I find 120 seconds gives a lot of clarity to the meeting, and because I’ve been adding things throughout the week longer doesn’t help much. If I am meeting with someone right after another meeting, I’ll take time in the morning to review the agenda, but usually it’s right before we meet.
This helps prevent me from being surprised by something they added, but it gives me a sense of the flow the conversation will most likely have. I can think about how much time we might need to spend in certain areas. It lets me go “we have a really full agenda today, what is most useful for us to tackle today”.
Listen Actively
This advice is thrown around a lot, so I’ll give you my unique twist here.
I close slack. I close my email tab. I have my phone on silent, out of reach, with the screen down. I have a teleprompter which sits on the end of my camera where I fullscreen the video call (I mostly manage remotely), and I minimize my own face (most of the time).
The teleprompter is nice because when I look at my report, on their end it looks like I am staring at them. On my end, it’s a distraction free screen. No notifications, no nothing. I also place the camera to the left of my desk, so I physically have to turn to face them.
This means if I do go on my screens, I have to turn my body, and it’s very obvious I am “distracted”. In practice I do this because I am taking notes, or I am looking into something that came up in the call, and I tell them this. When I physically turn back to the camera, they can literally see me returning my full focus to them and the conversation.
I think this comes across as extreme, but for me I would get distracted during calls. I’d think of a camera lens I was interested in and search for how expensive it is. It always felt innocent, but then I would realize I hadn’t really been listening for a minute, even though it felt like I had been.
For slack, I found if my manager messaged me, I’d respond in the middle of a 1:1. Here it felt like I was optimizing my time, but in reality I was wasting my direct reports time.
This 30 minute meeting may be the 10th one I’ve had this week, but it’s the only minutes my engineer will get with me that week. They deserve my full attention.
Do what you say
I had a problem in my 1:1s where my direct reports would ask me something, and I would always say yes because I am just so helpful, and 10% of the time something would come up and I could no longer complete the request. Worse, a majority of these I would get so busy their task would simply get bumped lower and lower on my todo list, that by the time we met next, I had forgotten they even asked!
This erodes trust. It feels bad. Don’t be me.
Instead if something comes up, let them know. Don’t wait for the 1:1, just tell them. I also review my task list every single morning and anything that is for my direct reports gets bumped back to the top of the list.
This is not a status report
I covered this in the other article, but it bears repeating. A status report is generally a waste of time. Your direct reports want to get things done, if they are only meeting with you to tell you how things are going, you’re failing as a manager.
You can get status in Github, Jira, Slack, project pages, standups, project meetings, etc. Whatever tools and mechnisms you have, get status of things there. And if you can’t, make that a conversation in your 1:1:
“Hey, I would like to make sure our 1:1 time is as valuable for you as possible, let’s talk about the best way I can stay up to date without using our 1:1 time for it”.
Some of my engineers love to include status in our 1:1s. They like to talk about what they did that week. That’s okay, but I direct the topics to challenges they encountered, how they worked with other teams, how this impacts their goals, etc. I still want them to drive the agenda, but I’m going to poke around and look for areas to give them feedback on (positive or constructive), I’m going to look for areas to coach on.
Be upfront about your topics
If you have something you want to talk about, let this be known at the start of the meeting. I usually say “Hey, I need to steal 5 minutes for our agenda today to give some org updates” or “I have a few non-urgent things I’d like to talk about, but if we can’t get to it today that’s alright, we can focus on your topics/agenda first”.
Some things are time sensitive, such as letting them know about a team member who is leaving, and some are just nice to haves if we have time.
What I try to emphasize here is that this is still their meeting. I may have things to contribute, but unless it’s time sensitive, we may not get to my agenda items and that’s okay.
Check in before delivering feedback
If you need to give constructive criticism, check in first.
“Hey, I wanted to give some constructive feedback on your presentation yesterday, are you in a good spot for that?”
This takes very little time, and it prevents awkward situations. “Actually, I am giving my 2 week notice” or “Oh, I just found out my mom is very sick, can we talk about that another day? I don’t think I’m really going to be able to hear what you have to say”.
This happens very rarely of course, but it does happen. It’s a respectful way to kick off giving feedback in a 1:1, and it helps you align to their headspace. They may not care about getting feedback on their presentation, just because it’s something you want to give.
Better in person 1:1’s
If you are meeting in person, mix it up.
If you normally grab a stuffy office room, go for a walk. If you always walk, go play a game of pool while you chat.
Always check in first as they may have something more sensitive that requires privacy, and you don’t want them to just not talk about it. Remember, you are the manager, a lot of people struggle to push back and communicate effectively because of the power dynamic. They may internally think “well, we’re in this public space, I guess we won’t get to talk about how I’m unhappy right now”.
If you’ve never had a walking 1:1, I highly recommend it! And if mobility is hard for you, just getting out of the office or trying a different spot can still be very nice.
That’s it! Those are the tips. I hope they are helpful, but if I missed something please let us know!