Directing one-on-ones

- I know the importance of having consistent one-on-one meetings with each of my direct reports but early in my leadership journey, I often failed to include a structure in these meetings. I was just so eager to be that supportive people leader that I'd leave our agenda completely open for the team members to bring whatever was top of mind for them. The result? Unproductive meetings. A waste of time for me, for them and for our company. I eventually changed my approach by adapting an effective six-step process. It has clear expectations but still allows for support and collaboration. I'm going to walk you through the six steps of this process so that you'll be prepared to direct one-on-ones that will yield results for your team and your organization. Step one, rating report. You ask on a scale of 1 to 10, how are you feeling professionally? And on a scale of 1 to 10, how are you feeling personally? They do not need to share with you why they're rating each area a certain way but the number rating allows you to know where their head space is at. If they are fully engaged or maybe distracted. And if they do want to share why, then it will further build the connection to support enhanced communication. Step two, meaningful accomplishment. You ask since the last time we met, what has been your most meaningful accomplishment? This gives them an opportunity to share and really highlight a win, something they're proud of. It could potentially be an accomplishment you didn't even know about, didn't realize was so significant to them or were unaware of the impact it had outside of your team. Step three, biggest roadblock. You ask what is your biggest roadblock right now? While you may not spend much, if any time here during this meeting, this question provides them space to bring challenges to your attention. What's potentially standing in the way of them completing a task or reaching a goal? This gives them a voice and a place to he heard. These first three steps demonstrate your interest in the person, not just the results, yet they only take approximately 10 minutes. Step four, commitment check. You say please report on your commitments from our last meeting. This is where they'll share the outcome from completed commitments and/or the reasons why they may not have completed certain tasks. Here you may catch any potential performance issues and now have a consistent process to track and monitor. This step may not take place the first time you meet with this new process, unless you already have a list of commitments to review from a prior meeting. Step five, focus work. You ask what priority, project, or problem would you like to focus on today? The team member is responsible for bringing something meaningful to the meeting, something they need or would like your assistance with. This step is where you two will spend the majority of time during the one-on-one meeting, brainstorming and collaborating on next steps. Step six, commitment list. You say here are the agreed upon commitments from today. Based upon the project work in the previous step, the two of you will create a list of list of commitments that will need to be completed on or before your next one-on-one. During that next meeting, this is the list you'll review during step four, commitment report. These final three steps are focused on the results. They establish priorities and commitments and hold the team member accountable. Before you begin with these six steps, you'll want to communicate this new process with your team. So today, schedule a call or send an email where you'll review why and how you'll be directing these one-on-ones moving forward.