How To Run Effective 1:1 Meetings - Opinionated Runbook

First thing you hear as a new Engineering Manager is "You should have regular 1:1s with your team." Sounds simple!

Only, it isn't.

According to various surveys, nearly half of employees rate their 1:1 experience as suboptimal. It's also a topic that many managers struggle with. They complain about low engagement, lack of meaningful conversation, and the feeling that they're just ticking checkboxes for the sake of it.

For such a critical management tool, there's surprisingly little consensus on how to run 1:1s properly. Most companies don't provide templates or guidance.

So managers wing it. They try their best, but end up falling into the same traps over and over. I certainly did.

Based on my years of experience as an engineering leader and lessons learned from mistakes, I've created this opinionated handbook on how to prepare and run 1:1 meetings as a manager.

Something that I wish I had back in the day.

It's designed to work in most of the situations you'll face. It targets 1:1s with your direct reports and will guide you step by step on how to set up, run, and manage your 1:1 meetings for maximum efficiency. Enjoy!

Team in the Centre

After running hundreds of 1:1 meetings with dozens of engineers and managers, I can encapsulate the essence of 1:1 meetings in this one sentence:

These meetings aren't for me. They're for my team.

It sounds obvious now, but I'd been approaching 1:1s all wrong. I'd show up with my agenda, my questions, my concerns about the project. I was using this time to extract information and get status updates. To get what I needed from them. Instead, I needed to focus on what they need from me.

My 1:1s finally started to be meaningful when I flipped the script entirely. Instead of bringing just my agenda to the table, I ask my reports to bring theirs. Instead of talking, I listen. I'm there to help, not to review.

Once I understood this, everything else fell into place.

Expected Outcome

Why do I bother with one-on-one meetings? Why should I invest my time and effort in them? What outcome do I expect to get in return?

• I want to build relationships - one-on-one meetings help me establish strong, trusting relationships with my teammates, which is essential for a positive work environment and open, honest communication.
• Give and receive feedback - these meetings are a perfect place to give (and ask for!) feedback, helping both me and my reports grow and improve in our roles.
• Share and address concerns - I want my teammates to have a safe place to voice their concerns, discuss challenges, and seek guidance.
• Foster personal growth - I want to both guide my reports on how they can grow in their roles and monitor their progress toward their personal development goals.

Scheduling 1:1 Meetings

I strongly recommend having weekly 1:1s with direct reports. Weekly meetings let me build momentum. I can follow up on conversations from last week while they're still fresh. I can catch small problems before they become big ones. I can maintain continuity in discussing someone's growth and development.

I do sometimes switch to a bi-weekly schedule if my direct reports are senior enough or if we have close daily contact. Anything less frequent and I lose the thread. The meetings become these big, heavy check-ins instead of natural, flowing conversations.

And yes, I stopped cancelling them. Ever. Even when deadlines loom. Especially when deadlines loom. That's when my team needs me most.

Preparing Agenda

As I like to say, if a meeting is important enough to schedule, it should have an agenda, and a one-on-one is no exception.

The key factor here is that I don't drive the agenda of this meeting on my own. I ask my teammates to bring their topics to the table. But if I just leave this responsibility to them, they may struggle, especially in the beginning, with knowing what they should talk about.

To help them, I established a framework to guide them. I prepare a high-level agenda of topics that should be discussed in 1:1s and ask them to fill in the details before every meeting. This allows me to set up a guiding rail and nudge them to contribute.