One-on-one meetings (usually abbreviated as “1:1’s”) are supposed to be a chance for your direct reports to share concerns with you, and for you to provide some coaching on performance issues or career advice.
The reality is often far different – rather than being a mechanism for the employee to share questions and concerns, a 1:1 can easily become a mechanism for the manager to get status updates, share information on upcoming projects, and solve problems. It becomes a command performance that, far from putting the employee at ease, raises their stress level.
Let me say up front that I am guilty of this, as so many managers are. The 1:1 is meant to serve the employee, not the manager, and I have often gotten that reversed.
There is a better way.
In The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever, author Michael Bungay Stanier provides a template for having an employee-centric conversation with your team members. Stanier doesn’t mention 1:1’s by name – his focus is on coaching in general – but his method is tailor-made for regular 1:1 conversations, which is where most coaching takes place.
Stanier’s method revolves around seven essential questions meant to draw your team member into discussion. Rather than seeking to solve a problem for the employee, the questions help you guide the employee to reach the solution himself. Your role as manager shifts from know-it-all expert to a coach invested in helping the employee on a journey of growth.
Along the way, Stanier shares tidbits of wisdom like:
- Ask one question at a time.
- Don’t offer up advice with a question mark attached. (“Have you tried X?” sounds better than “try X.” It’s not.)
- Don’t fill silences. The discomfort you both feel can often open up deeper conversations.
- Listen actively.
The Coaching Habit is a short book and a quick read. At 213 pages, you can through it in a couple of hours. It will be time well spent.