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Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

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Re: Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

#181

Post by jameshart »

jonathankoren wrote: post #163
xyzelement wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What people want their career to be is often immature. It takes wisdom and experience to figure out what you should want. So coming into the conversation with that is limiting. I'd rather get the manager to be a partner in helping me figure out what I should want.

Then you should talk about how you you need help coming up with a plan! If I was your manager, I’d tell you that while your problem about setting career goals is real, your framing of the problem as something I the manager should tell you what your goal is is backwards. I’m not living your life, you are. The path of least resistance for me is to let you stagnate right where you are and then tell you you’re perfectly…

No, what young developers (possibly other employees too) really want is not to be asked what they want to do, they want to be told what they would be good at.

They don’t know! I didn’t when I was a young dev; still don’t if I’m honest. And for years all I ever really wanted a manager to say was ‘here’s a pathway I could see you going down’.

If there is one thing mentors and managers can usefully do it is to stop asking stuff like ‘what motivates you?’ and start saying ‘you might be good at X’

Re: Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

#182

Post by [deleted] »

mshake2 wrote: post #7

These have always been an enormous waste of time from my perspective. They only serve to make a manager feel like they know what everyone is doing, all the time. Anything process-wise should be handled through scrum. Anything personal can be handled with ad-hoc 1-on-1 meetings as needed, but should be pretty rare. 1-on-1s for process really do harm to transparency and accountability. If I had a nickel for every time…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

#183

Post by quickthrower2 »

xyzelement wrote: post #128

In brief: 1. What worries you? Not some blatant project stuff but bigger deal issues. "How do I learn enough here to make a lot more money in a few years" or "I don't understand how our product is going to make money in this environment". Stuff like that is probably on your mind in some way (unless you are an unthinking dolt, but you wouldn't be asking this if you were) - get it out there and gain perspective. 2. Bli…

Never got a good answer to the “lot more” money question. The real answer is usually “not here, because we got you ha ha, unless you have a title bump”. Salary in increases are normal but a 50% bump seems to require changing jobs and probably country.

Re: Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

#185

Post by [deleted] »

massysett wrote: post #172
mshake2 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point of a stand is for the team to synchronize and raise potential issues. If the team is small, cross-functional, and working in the same area, it has a lot of value. You seem to be looking at this from the perspective of "what can I, the manager, get out of this" instead of "what can the team get out of this."

That's laughable - my team does not want stand-ups and after I asked them many times whether they would like regular meetings, they suggested doing a team meeting every few weeks, so you have no idea how I am looking at this.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

#186

Post by screwturner68 »

I've had great managers in the past and I've had absolute shit managers in the past but one thing that is constant is my need not to talk to them. There are really only a couple of times we need to talk outside of the twice a year review the first being if I'm fucking up and I try to avoid these calls. The only other time we need to talk is if we have company business to discus, since my manager isn't technical if he needs to run something by a technical person I am happy to help or if I see a company need and have a solution I will reach out to them to get their opinion. Outside of that I don't need or want to talk to a manager ever.

Re: Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

#187

Post by Shatnerz »

superfrank wrote: post #70
mshake2 wrote: post #7

These have always been an enormous waste of time from my perspective. They only serve to make a manager feel like they know what everyone is doing, all the time. Anything process-wise should be handled through scrum. Anything personal can be handled with ad-hoc 1-on-1 meetings as needed, but should be pretty rare. 1-on-1s for process really do harm to transparency and accountability. If I had a nickel for every time…

I'm a manager running two teams right now. The way I run my 1:1s I try and keep status updates out of them as much as possible. Like you said, "here's what I'm working on" type updates should be handled by Scrum. I still run 1:1s every two weeks with each one of my direct reports for a few reasons: - There are some people who just won't speak up or request an ad-hoc 1-on-1 if something is wrong. It's just a personali…

> If you want to cancel it every time, that's fine

I would amend this to "If they want to cancel it every time, that's fine".

I personally think its best to keep 1-1 availability as consistent as possible. Always be available to spend the time and avoid last minute changes to the meeting. The time is an opportunity for the direct report as well. If they want to cancel, that is fine. Same with whether they want to use the whole slot or only 5 minutes. Cancellations and changes from the manager side may throw plans askew since reports might be hanging onto something to unleash during the time.

Re: Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

#189

Post by mshake2 »

massysett wrote: post #172
mshake2 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point of a stand is for the team to synchronize and raise potential issues. If the team is small, cross-functional, and working in the same area, it has a lot of value. You seem to be looking at this from the perspective of "what can I, the manager, get out of this" instead of "what can the team get out of this."

That's laughable - my team does not want stand-ups and after I asked them many times whether they would like regular meetings, they suggested doing a team meeting every few weeks, so you have no idea how I am looking at this.

You opened this line of conversation with "As a manager it is critically important that I have a sense of what my staff is doing." Not "it's very important to my team that they have X process." I only know what you tell me.

Re: Ask HN: What do you talk about in 1-on-1s with your managers?

#190

Post by pan69 »

mshake2 wrote: post #7

These have always been an enormous waste of time from my perspective. They only serve to make a manager feel like they know what everyone is doing, all the time. Anything process-wise should be handled through scrum. Anything personal can be handled with ad-hoc 1-on-1 meetings as needed, but should be pretty rare. 1-on-1s for process really do harm to transparency and accountability. If I had a nickel for every time…

Your 1:1's shouldn't be about your work and progress on a project. It should be about "you" and how you feel about your position in the team, the things that are bugging you, etc.

However, often, before you can have a meaningful conversation with your manager you need to have build some sort of relationship first. By having a scheduled based (e.g. every two weeks) 1:1's will allow you to create a report with your manager. You can talk about anything, doesn't have to be work, can be hobby etc. Try to find a common interest. Maybe you're both games or rock climbers. Whatever. The main point is that you create a relationship with your manager in which you feel that you can talk to this person.

I have 1:1's with my team members and often we just talk about what we did on the weekend. It's not the objective to drag your personal life into your work environment but its to create a meaningful trust relationship. Once that is established you can have a meaningful conversation that could lean more towards your feelings.

As a manager and/or team lead, one of the worst things is to have an unhappy person on your team.

Edit: PS, forgot to add. Its best that the manager you have 1:1's with is not a person who you work with on a day to day basis. I.e. not your project/team lead e.g. but someone unrelated to your daily efforts.

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