One to One Resources

Published 7 April 2020
One to one meeting illustration
Supposedly, two people in a one-to-one meeting

Intro

When I first started to manage some people at Marshmallow, the one thing I really wanted to get ready for was one-to-one meetings. They are such an important part of the relationship between a manager and their reports. They give the opportunity to learn more form each other, understand ones goals and their progress towards them, and they are usually how you can build a good relationship enabling easy feedback.

Of course, I had been in many by this time, but always as an individual contributor. And if I could identify some things that my managers had done right, it was hard to know if they would be relevant for the people I would manage.

There are many scarier situation you might have to handle as a manager. Having a hard salary discussion with someone. Having to fire someone. But, they are much rarer and you would be unlucky if you have to deal with some of these right when you become a manager. While, if you’re in a company that have regular one-to-one meetings between employees and their manager, you will undoubtedly have some on your first week.

Here are some resources I found useful over time to help with one-to-one meetings.

Question ideas

Questions for first one-to-one meeting with a new employee

Questions for your first one-to-one meeting with someone

Questions for your one-to-one meetings

Templates

Template for one-to-one meeting looking back at the year

Template for one-to-one meeting from an Engineering Manager at Monzo

Overall advice

Common mistakes with one-to-one meetings

Advice to improve your one-to-one meetings