I used to run my 1-on-1s like status meetings.

I'd come in with my agenda. My updates. My questions about their projects. By the time we hit 30 minutes, I'd talked for most of it. My team member had answered my questions, given me their status, and left.

I thought I was being efficient. I was being a bad manager.

The problem wasn't the questions I was asking. It was whose meeting I thought it was.

A 1-on-1 is not your meeting.

It's theirs.

Your job in a 1-on-1 is not to download information or share updates. You have other forums for that. The 1-on-1 is the one place on your team's calendar that belongs entirely to them — their blockers, their thinking, their development, their concerns.

When you run it like a status check, you're not just wasting the time. You're signaling something: that their calendar exists to serve your information needs, not their growth.

Most new managers don't realize they're doing this. I didn't.

The 70/30 rule

The fix is simple, even if it takes practice.

They talk 70% of the time. You talk 30%.

That's it. That's the rule.

In a 30-minute 1-on-1, you should be speaking for about 9 minutes. The rest is them.

Your 9 minutes isn't silence — it's questions, reactions, coaching, and the occasional direction. But your default mode is listening, not filling space.

The reason this is hard for new managers — especially technical ones — is that silence feels unproductive. When there's a pause, the instinct is to fill it with information, context, your own perspective. That instinct served you well in technical discussions. In a 1-on-1, it shuts the other person down.

What to actually ask

The quality of your 1-on-1 lives or dies on the questions you open with.

Not "how are things going?" — too easy to deflect with "fine."

Not "any blockers?" — too narrow, invites a one-word answer.

These are the questions that actually open a conversation:

What's been on your mind since we last spoke?

Where do you feel like you have the most clarity right now — and where are you least sure?

Is there anything you've been hesitant to bring up?

What would make next week better than this one?

What's something you'd do differently if you had more time or fewer constraints?

None of these have a one-word answer. All of them invite thinking, not reporting.

The structure that works

A 30-minute 1-on-1 doesn't need to be complicated. Here's the structure I come back to:

First 5 minutes: Check in. Not project check-in — them as a person. How are they actually doing? You'll get a sense quickly whether this is a business-as-usual week or something's off.

Next 20 minutes: Their agenda. What do they want to work through? What do they need from you — a decision, a sounding board, a resource, just to be heard? Let them drive.

Last 5–10 minutes: Your turn. If they've covered everything they need, use the remaining time for your updates, context you want to share, or things coming down the pipeline they should know about.

One important note: if you have something substantial to work through with them — a project deep-dive, a performance conversation, a detailed review — don't bring it to the 1-on-1. Schedule separate time for it. The 1-on-1 belongs to them first. Protecting that boundary is what makes them actually show up to it.

The thing that actually changes when you get this right

When your team knows their 1-on-1 time is genuinely theirs — that they can bring real concerns, half-formed ideas, things they're uncertain about — they start using it that way.

You stop being surprised by problems that have been building for weeks. You stop hearing about blockers after they've become crises. You start getting earlier signal on how your team is actually doing, not just how their projects are doing.

And over time, the 1-on-1 becomes one of the most valuable 30 minutes on your calendar.

Not because of what you say in it. Because of what they do.

— Andrea

If someone forwarded this to you and you want to subscribe, you can do so here.

P.S. Not sure where you actually are in the transition? I built a free 5-minute assessment that shows you exactly which IC habits are still running the show — across how you execute, communicate, and delegate ownership. Nine questions. Immediate results. You can find it here.