One-on-one meeting template and agenda builder

One-on-one agenda builder

Pick the meeting type and length, tick the questions you want to ask, and copy the agenda.

• Weekly check-in: The standing 1:1 with each direct report, weekly or every other week.
• Career conversation: Once a quarter, separate from the weekly 1:1 so growth never gets squeezed out.
• Feedback 1:1: When there is something specific to discuss, in either direction.
• First 1:1 with a new hire: In their first week, then weekly through their first 90 days.
• Skip-level 1:1: A leader with their manager's reports, once or twice a year each.

The one-on-one meeting template

The weekly version as a running doc. Copy it once per direct report and add a new dated block above the last one each time you meet.

1:1: [their name] and [your name]
Every [weekday] at [time], 30 minutes

[Date of this meeting, newest on top]

Last time's actions
- [x] Done item
- [ ] Carried over, new date:

Their topics (12 min)
-

Progress and blockers (8 min)
-

My topics (4 min)
-

Next steps (6 min)
- What, who, by when

Growth note (once a month)
-

Four rules that make it work

• Their topics go first. It's their meeting; your list only gets what time is left.
• Both of you add to it all week. A thought on Tuesday goes in the doc, not a stray chat message.
• Start with last time's actions. Tick off what's done and give anything carried over a new date.
• Write actions as what, who and by when. "Send the launch plan, Sam, Friday" gets done; "look into launch" doesn't.

How often to hold one-on-ones

Regular beats long. A short 1:1 that always happens is worth more than an hour that keeps moving.

• Weekly, 30 minutes: the default for most direct reports, and for anyone new or in a busy stretch.
• Every other week, 30 to 45 minutes: for experienced people who work on their own, or a manager with a big team.
• Quarterly, 45 to 60 minutes: a career conversation on its own slot, so growth never gets squeezed by this week's fires.
• First 90 days, weekly: new hires need the time most, even when they say they're fine.
• Skip-levels, once or twice a year per person: enough for a leader to hear the team firsthand.
• Move it, don't cancel it: reschedule within the same week. A cancelled 1:1 tells someone they come last.

Questions to bring to your manager

The builder covers what a manager asks. These are for the other chair: eight questions an employee can add to the doc.

• What's the most important thing I could finish this month?
• What do you wish I'd done differently on the last project?
• What does the next level look like for my role, specifically?
• Where am I spending time that doesn't matter much to you?
• What's coming up for the team that I should get ready for?
• Who outside our team should I get to know?
• Do you want to hear about problems early and rough, or later with a fix?
• Is there anything about how I communicate that you'd change?

Want a lighter way to open? A one-word warm-up from our check-in questions takes ten seconds and tells you how the rest of the half hour will go.

Notes and follow-ups

The doc is the memory of the relationship. Five habits keep it useful a year from now.

• One shared doc per person. Both of you can edit it, newest meeting on top, so nothing lives only in your head.
• Keep private notes somewhere else. Pay, health and personal matters stay out of the shared doc.
• Send nothing after the meeting. The actions are already in the doc you both wrote; a recap email is a second copy to keep in sync.
• Reread the last month before a hard talk. Patterns show up in notes long before they show up in results.
• Use it at review time. A year of notes is the evidence a fair review needs, written when things happened.

When review season comes, those notes give you the examples; our performance review phrases help you put them into words.

Six mistakes that make 1:1s feel pointless

If people dread their one-on-ones, it's usually one of these.

• Turning it into a status update. Anything you could read in a tracker belongs in the tracker.
• Doing most of the talking. If you spoke more than they did, it was your meeting, not theirs.
• Cancelling first when the week gets busy. Busy weeks are when people most need the half hour.
• Saving feedback for review season. If it's worth saying, say it this week, while the example is fresh.
• Only booking one when there's a problem. Then every invite reads like bad news.
• No follow-through. The same blocker three weeks running means the meeting isn't working.

Train your managers to run better one-on-ones

Running a good 1:1 is a skill like any other. An hour on the skills underneath it helps a whole group of managers at once.

KraftyLab books live lunch and learn workshops for teams: about an hour with a live host on your call, Zoom by default, or Teams, Google Meet or Webex on request. Three that fit a managers’ group, with today’s prices: