One to ones: boost performance in 20mins
If your one to ones turn into status updates and diary admin, you’re not alone. The good news is that, with a simple structure, 20 minutes is long enough to start building trust and boost performance. All you need is a practical agenda and a bank of good questions, so your 1-2-1s can become your most productive meetings each week.
“A manager having one meaningful conversation per week with each team member develops high-performance relationships more than any other leadership activity.” (Gallup.com)
What should a 1-2-1 achieve?
Well, a good 1-2-1 should help you and your team member:
Set priorities and expectations - making sure you communicate effectively, support their career development and openly discuss performance.
Work through any issues that may be worrying them, or solve problems that are preventing work from going ahead.
Discuss progress and how it connects to personal goals, as well as the business. This is the perfect time to discuss learning and development plans too!
How often should you have 1-2-1s with your team?
This depends on the context - how busy is the team, what kind of work do they carry out, are you in the office or working remotely?
Not to mention different people require different cadences - the best way to find that out is by asking them! If a team member prefers fortnightly vs weekly 1-2-1s, it’s worth trying that out to see if it works for you both.
As an example, organisational psychologist Steven Rogelberg suggests about 25 minutes a week, or 50 minutes every fortnight. He suggests a focus on quality over quantity though - agonising over the perfect timings won’t help if the time you spend together isn’t productive.
What are the biggest meeting mistakes?
Turning 1-2-1s into status meetings - there’s plenty of more efficient ways to check the status of tasks and projects! Use your 1-2-1s for decisions, coaching and support, and have genuine conversations instead of checking off to-do lists.
Skipping or repeatedly rescheduling - it’s a bad habit that just signals the meeting isn’t important. If you must cancel, immediately reschedule for the next available time, and don’t just cancel without a replacement unless you really have to.
Doing all the talking! Aim for the team member to speak for most of the time - you want to be using open questions that encourage them to share, so you can provide them with the right level of support.
A classic one to close off with - vague actions. Make sure any actions are assigned to a person, with a deadline and a clear idea of what success looks like. Note this down in a share location or via email, so you can both access it after the call, and make sure you follow up on progress regularly.
Remote and hybrid teams
There’s a few habits that impact 1-2-1 calls a lot more than people think - for example, keep cameras on by default, minimise notifications, and share a simple rolling doc for agenda and actions. Resist the urge to look at emails or messages whilst in the call - multitasking is the bane of any meeting organiser - and give your full attention to your colleague.
Working remotely can make these meeting mistakes a lot more damaging (it feels easier to cancel calls somehow) and it’s easier to become disconnected when you’re not face-to-face. Making sure cameras are on whenever possible means you’ll be able to speak a bit more naturally, and also helps both parties get a sense of how the other is feeling. Tone doesn’t always translate when there’s no facial expressions to accompany them! After all, they say over 50% of communication is non-verbal…
A reusable 20-minute 1-2-1 template
Copy this into your calendar invites, and use it as a template to send via email after each 1-2-1 so everyone has a record. Update as needed with your team:
1-2-1 [Name] – [Date]
1. Good news
2. Top priorities this [week/month]
3. Blockers or decisions needed
4. Support required
5. Actions
Power questions for sharper 1-2-1s
Pick a couple that feel most useful at the time - no need to read out the whole lot!
What feels most valuable for us to solve in this conversation?
If we only made one decision today that would unlock progress, what is it?
Where are handoffs or dependencies slowing you down?
What would great look like by Friday, and how will we know?
What is one thing I can do to make your work easier this week?
What did you learn this week that we should keep or scale?
Guidance for managers in a nutshell: have regular 1-2-1s, be present, and use open questions to help people generate their own insight.
Why does this matter for performance management?
If your performance system relies on annual reviews, it will struggle to keep pace with real work. CIPD’s latest guidance encourages ongoing, evidence-based conversations that connect objectives, feedback and development, and regular 1-2-1s are the practical heartbeat of that approach.
And the broader context matters: engagement levels have been fragile in recent years, which makes frequent, high-quality manager conversations an essential lever for performance and retention.
At BiteSize Learning, our philosophy is simple. People perform best when they are happy in their work and enjoy what they do. We help managers build the relationships and culture that make happiness and high performance inevitable.
Ready to lift your team's performance?
If you want to provide your team with a complete, hands-on session around objective setting, coaching and feedback, explore our Performance Management course. It’s a live, two-hour session with practical tools and real scenarios you can use straight away!
