A regular one-on-one catch-up with your reports (and your manager!) is an important part of your working relationship with your colleagues, and can be critical to their success and growth in the role, as well as your own.

Whether you interact with them regularly for work, or let take a very hands-off approach, this meeting is a great way for the two of you to take a step back from the nitty-gritty, and look at the bigger picture.

This involves checking in with how they are feeling and tracking, personally and professionally, and helping them to take steps to flourish in the role. It is also a useful stage-gate to make sure they are working on the right things.

At a minimum, these meetings should occur at least once a month, but fortnightly or even weekly catch-ups may be preferred. Ideally, both parties get value out of these sessions, so agree on a cadence that works best.

And, like any good conversation between two people, this meeting has got to be equal parts give and take. This starts with having both people contributing to the agenda, but also listening as much as talking.

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For Meetric users, we recommend using this template as follows:

1. Copy the template into your meeting notes in Meetric against all of your one-on-ones (with your reports, and with your manager).
2. Share the link in the meeting event (if your team is all on Meetric, they will already have access), and encourage them to add detail under any agenda section, or to add their own agenda points altogether!
3. Before you launch into business, do a quick check-in with your report to see how they are going personally, which provides important context for how they may be feeling/performing at work!
4. Step through the agenda, one-by-one, letting your report drive the conversation. You can ask probing or clarifying questions where needed, but try keep things outcome-focused. And keep an eye on time with the Meetric timer!
5. Record important notes and actions below the relevant agenda items, including both your report and yourself. Having a shared view of actions gives each person a greater sense of accountability for their own actions, and confidence in the other person to do theirs.
6. Save a few minutes at the end (thanks to the Meetric timer), to make sure your report has the opportunity to raise anything else that might not have been covered.
7. Finally, send a recap to summarise the next steps for your report.
8. The next time you catch-up, you can quickly review outstanding actions from past meetings using the Time Machine!

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