Real Velona

There has been quite a bit of chatter on socials recently, that 1-1s are dumb and that most ultra successful founders don’t do them.

I think much of this discourse traces back to an interview Jensen Huang did where he described his management structure and style. He talked about having a huge number of direct reports, and when questioned about how he manages this, he said he doesn’t do 1-1s and gave the reason that he is mostly worried about the information asymmetry that the 1-1 creates.

This piqued my interest, because I have had a love and hate relationship with 1-1s during my management career, and I’ll admit that at some points of my career, I would have picked this up and run with it. I know there are many leaders who really don’t love the 1-1 and would drop it pretty quickly if it became politically acceptable to do so.

Over my career I spent a lot of time reading and experimenting on 1-1s, and I wanted to share the approach I tried to work to.

Firstly let me say I am not a fan of the “the agenda is yours” approach. Whilst there should always be space for your team member to introduce topics, it should not be purely about their agenda. In my experience 1-1s are done best when you can weave them across four core areas of concern across.

Social and Wellbeing – What is going on outside of work, is your team member going through something significant at the moment that you need to be aware of. Sometimes a team member may not be performing as usual. It is incumbent on you to discover whether there is something else going on in their personal lives before trying to manage the situation. The last thing you want as a manager and a leader is to be applying additional stress and pressure that may lead them to a breakdown, or to quitting their job. We don’t leave our home lives at the door when we go to work, and our relationship with our manager is one of the most important relationships in our lives. This part of your 1-1 is best done in an informal setting.

One pro-tip I can share here is to try and take an interest in, and/or participate in their hobbies. Every now and then, i tried taking my 1-1 on the road. I’ve been on bike rides with my team members who were into cycling, on bush walks, out for gastronomy experiences(a particular favourite of mine). Whether it’s tennis, music or whatever they are into, sharing an experience like this can create a deeper bond with your team member, and make them comfortable enough to share their problems with you.

Tactical – Are there any system blockers or impediments that are getting in the way of your team members day to day work. The concept of servant leadership gets discussed a lot in modern management theory, but I prefer to think of it in terms of your responsibility here as a systems thinker and architect. Helping unblock system issues will also help you understand where the organisational system may be in need of some renovation, either through tweaking business processes, policies or through organisational structure. This seems to be one of Elon Musks superpowers.

Strategic – This is a great place to check in on OKRs, how are they going with their individual OKRs, how is their team going, are there any blockers or risks related to executing on the companies strategy. This is where you can glean how the strategic execution is going, and this is a very important aspect of the strategy cascade up and down the organisation. By checking up on it regularly as part of the 1-1 meeting, you will send a signal that this is important to you. Like it or not, what you choose to talk about consistently at your 1-1 meeting will signal what is important to you. If they know you will be asking about strategy execution regularly at your 1-1s, then they will make sure to prioritise it. One of your most important roles as a manager is to lead the companies strategy, and it is imperative that you are talking about it with your team members regularly throughout the year.

Career – One of the most important conversations to have with your team members is the career conversation. In many organisations this may only happen once at hire, and in a few organisations it might happen once a year, at the annual review cycle. I am a firm believer that the level of engagement within your team is very highly correlated to how closely they are aligned to their career path, whether they feel that their career is progressing and whether you are helping them towards this aim.

As a manager this is one of your most important responsibilities, and the beauty of addressing this as part of your regular 1-1 meetings is that it allows you to spread this conversation out over a longer period. You can help your team member by picking up on things that they like and dislike throughout the year, things that they are naturally good at, or not, and help them synthesise this into a career aspiration and plan. Although this isn’t something you would talk about at every 1-1, it is definitely something that you would pick up every now and then, especially if they are having a particularly difficult time or bring a lack of motivation as a concern to the 1-1. Picking it up this way across a series of 1-1s across the year also allows time to analyse, synthesise and think, and will make your annual career planning much easier.

Tips, patterns and anti-patterns.

Agenda Setting / Tools

Over the years I discovered that setting an agenda for your 1-1 ahead of time, can be very helpful to making sure it is run effectively, efficiently and importantly that both parties can come prepared for the meeting. This isn’t to say you need to do homework for it all the time, but sometimes just having a think about something before coming to the meeting will make the meeting much more effective, than if you felt surprised by a topic, and ended up saying something on the spot that you either needed to backtrack later.

I found that tools can be very helpful here, and there are many HR systems that have introduced this functionality over the last few years. At my most recent organisation we used a tool which integrated natively to our chat program. It allowed for us to create a schedule, set a standing agenda and take notes to record decision and actions from the 1-1.

1-1 as a Coffee chat
If you choose to go completely unstructured with your 1-1, you may find that they degenerate into a coffee chat. Everyone is busy and has many priorities to deal with, it is only natural that if you offer a completely unstructured meeting time, especially if you are holding this at a cafe, that this will turn into a coffee chat. Whilst there is value in helping your team member decompress this format can tend to degenerate into gossip and complaining. If you find yourself in this scenario from time to time, it is best to focus on the social and well-being aspect of your 1-1.

Frequency
Every environment and every team is different. You will need to tweak your 1-1 schedule to fit your environment, but if your 1-1 frequency is too high, you will find yourself falling into “coffee-chat” mode, and if your 1-1 frequency is too low, then you will find that your team member will completely dominate the agenda with tactical problems they need to talk about, leaving little time for the other dimensions of the 1-1. In my experience, and the environments that I have worked, fortnightly seems to the the sweet spot for a 1-1.

Follow up
Following up on decision and actions that were part of previous 1-1s, again, whether you choose to follow up shows how important an item is to you. If you have an ask of your direct report, make sure that you follow up on that ask in the next 1-1. If your direct report had an ask of you, make sure that it is addressed in the next 1-1, and all future 1-1s until it comes to resolution. If you fail to do this, then you are sending the message that your team members needs are not important to you.

Policing
Often in your 1-1s you will come across personal conflicts. There will be team members who with issues about each other. My general view is to avoid adopting a policing attitude (with the exception of serious breaches and misconduct). It is important that your team works to resolve issues as peers. We don’t have to be friends with everyone on our team, we don’t even need to like each other but there is a professional responsibility to work together for the benefit of the organisation, and if someone is not living up to their expectations it is incumbent upon the individual to have a conversation with them about this.

In Summary

Despite some questioning their value, I feel 1-1s are a crucial tool for building relationships, addressing challenges, and driving growth. To get the most out of 1-1s, focus on the four core areas: Social and Wellbeing, Tactical, Strategic, and Career. By covering these areas and avoiding common pitfalls like unstructured meetings and a lack of follow-up, you can create a safe and supportive environment that helps team members thrive.

We aren’t all superstars like Jensen and Elon, so for the human amongst us, investing time and effort into 1-1s, you will increase engagement, motivation, and retention.