The Effective Manager Book

Team -

I've decided to start meeting with each member of the team on a weekly basis in meetings called One-On-Ones. I think this is a great way for us to maintain good, open communication, and continue to build our relationship. We'll be meeting for 30 minutes once a week, at a pre-scheduled time. It will be a private conversation - just you and I.

We will start 3 weeks from now.

The format of the 30 minutes will always be the same. The first 10 minutes are for YOUR agenda - anything you want to tell me, about anything. Your work, your family, your pets, your hobby, your challenges, your career, our working together. The primary focus of this One-On-One is going to be YOU. The middle ten minutes are for me, to share whatever I need to with you. We'll probably talk about projects you and I are working on, stuff I need from you, and things I've heard from up above. It will NOT be a team meeting with only one attendee; that is, I'm not just going to give you a ton of stuff to take notes on. The last 10 minutes are for us to talk about the future - your career, training, development, opportunities, etc. In my experience, a lot of the time you'll take 15 minutes, and I will too, so we won't get to the last segment. But that's okay, if we've covered what YOU want to cover, and I get a few minutes.

Some of you may say, "gee, we talk all the time." And, you'd be right, but a lot of those conversations are very short. And, they're usually about something very specific, so we don't get to share more info or go into more detail. Our One-On-Ones will allow us to do that.

Below is a schedule of possible times. I have already blocked all these times on my calendar, so I should be able to keep them. Maybe in the first few weeks, we will juggle things a bit, to figure out what works best for everyone.

I look forward to your replies requesting a time slot. Please reply to all so others will know that the time you've requested is taken.

Regards,