HOW TO THE GET PERFECTION IN ONE ON ONE MEETINGS

Most of the companies which are huge and have separate HR department, organize some one on one meetings with the employees. Those meetings are for different reasons, starting from getting the feedback from the employees, understanding their needs better and finishing up with just helping them and guiding with their way to the successful job.

However, it is important to mention that there are companies which are sometimes giving less attention and importance to this and delay the meetings from month to month. Those companies however are missing a lot here and today we will try to make a list of things you can do in order to make those one on one meetings a reality.

So, here we go:

1. Make a schedule, like you do for other important things

If you have in your schedule included many meetings with the clients, organizational stuff and didn’t include there the meetings with the employees, you will definitely forget about those meetings. In fact, you even thought they are not important enough to be added into your schedule. However, as you may guess those meetings are really important and if you wish to reach a success here, start with adding a point for this. Make sure you are giving it a comfortable time and even if you are busy with something else, follow your schedule and meet the employees.

2. Don’t let everything to one day

Well, if you have a huge company, you most probably won’t be able to meet with the employees one by one. This means you can organize some meetings with the separate departures of the company. If your company is not huge enough, then you can also manage to meet with the employees one by one. In both cases, make sure you are not letting all of the meetings be arranged on one day. Make some dates for this, let the employees know that they have to attend and go for it. The more you will delay this, the harder it will be. Imagine yourself telling the same thing (yes, sometimes you will repeat the same thing again and again several times) to the employees of various departments the same day? Nice, then separate them and you won’t get tired with this.

3. Make a list of things you want to get from the employees

All of those types of meetings have some purpose. Those cases can be different and we are sure you won’t be able to discuss everything all together. That is why you’d rather make a list of things which are priority to be discussed now:

• The feedback from the employees
• A reason to an exact job done (this can be in case, for example. when the job is not done properly and you want to know the possible reasons)
• New ideas about this or that project

Those are some of the issues you may want to discuss with the employees. So, in order to reach a successful one on one conversation, decide your priority question with that exact employee and go discuss it.

4. Create a structure of the meeting

Most of those kind of meetings are having some kind of structures. This can be difficult to keep when you are talking to only one person, because in these cases mostly more friendly conversations are being held. However, if you have your meeting with the employees of a department, you will most probably need a structure here. One of the reasons is that you don’t want to go there, talk for an hour and finish It up with making your employees be bored. Another reason is that structure will help you to make the meeting more constructive. So, if you have an hour for the meeting, here is what you can do:

• 20 minutes to your speech, which is the primary goal and what you really want to get from the meeting
• 20 minutes listening to feedback, discussing this or that question (the one, you talked about as a primary focus), brainstorming and sharing ideas
• 15 minutes to any suggestions, complains
• 5 minutes to deciding the future actions and finalizing the meeting

If you are stick to this structure, or the one that you decide to have, you will manage to have it done properly and will get the results you wanted to.

5. Don’t do it because you have to do it

Don’t go for it until you totally understand why you are doing it. Just ask you a question: if you are going to have the meeting and not listen to your employees at all and you think it is just a waste of time, then well: It IS a waste of time. However, if you really go deeper and analyze the effect that the feedback of the employees and the conversation with them can have, then do it for the company. Well, it may also be your responsibility, but it also should give you a pleasure. In other words, you should start enjoying the communication with the employees.

Those easy and helpful tricks will be really of a need for anyone who is struggling with the hard schedules and busy days. We hope that your one on one meetings and conversations will become even more effective and successful and sooner you will see the results. Good luck in that and have a good conversation!