97 Things Every Engineering Manager Should Know

Chapter 1. Advanced PeopleOps—One-on-One Retrospectives

Marcus Blankenship

Carmen’s heart sunk as she looked at her calendar. Back-to-back one-on-one meetings filled her day, overflowing into the next.

“Ugh…maybe I could call in sick. Or make up an excuse to work from home. My boss wouldn’t care. My team would be thrilled to skip them.”

“It’s not too late, you can still call in sick,” she thought as she stood in the Starbucks line, “But then what kind of boss would you be? It sucks, and everyone hates it, but you have to do it.”

“Sheesh, what are we gonna talk about? I guess I’ll just ask people what they’re working on this week, and hopefully, I can get each one done in five minutes. Oh! Or maybe we could do them in small groups! That would take soooooo much less time.”

“I’d better order an extra-large coffee with quad shots…I’m going to need it.”

Apply What You Already Know

I’m going to share a head-smackingly simple lesson that has served me well. Ready?

Make every fourth one-on-one meeting a retrospective to discuss improvements to your one-on-ones.

This is similar to a sprint retrospective, and you can use the same format. The point of a sprint retrospective is for the team to improve. The point of this retrospective is to improve your one-on-ones, making them more valuable for both of you.

That’s it. Go do it.

But, if you need a nudge…

Here are ...