1-to-1 - Daniil Malykh

Behind the Mask of High Performance

I joined a mature team. This team had a teammate who looked like a highly motivated developer. Every task was done on time. He delivered a high-quality code. And... During a one-to-one, he mentioned that he feels demotivated and doesn't like the project.

It was a big surprise for me because he always said that everything was going well. To be honest, it was always very difficult to speak with him. Because he is a very close person and doesn't like any discussions. So... Possessing this knowledge, we discussed a lot about scrum event improvements in our team—how to reduce the number and duration of all the meetings we have.

We revisited his story together, and I noticed that he had been working on one really huge task for months despite it being split into multiple tasks. Moreover, after months of working on the story, he didn't understand the purpose and value of the whole team's backlog.

I touched on topics about the business value of the tasks and tasks sizing with the team. I noticed, that the team asked a lot of questions to the business in the past, and they were not answered. Every teammate works only on his item and doesn't care about others' tasks.

I encouraged the team to split the tasks into items that could be handled by other team members, fostering a shared responsibility. They were interested in spreading their knowledge and open to something new.

I discussed with the PO and PM to create a meeting with the team to explain the business purpose of the tasks that the team is working on. We created an improvement plan that includes short presentations to cover all aspects of their tasks from the business point of view.

As a result, I got positive feedback from developers and managers. Because during the sessions a lot of items were simplified and improvement.

Finally, I always ask business to explain the purpose of a project to a team before the team starts work on it.

Know the team through the first one-to-one

The purpose of the initial 1-2-1s is to gain insight into a teammate's perspective on their responsibilities and current assignments, as well as to clarify the manager's capacity to support the teammate. Also, discuss their opinion on wells, improvements, and challenges they face.

The first 1-to-1 meeting is full of expectations and unknowns. It is a good time to introduce yourself again with detailed explanations about your role's duties, responsibilities, plans, etc... Additionally, during the meeting, you can gain knowledge of the team's concerns, impediments and challenges. I find it most interesting to hear my colleague's opinion about the team's future plans from his point of view.

For example, some questions for the first meetings:

What is the project you are currently working on?
Also, can you share the most recent project the team completed that you were proud of?
In your opinion, what is the primary responsibility of the team?
How are your fellow team members doing?
What do you find the most enjoyable about working here?
And, what do you don't enjoy as much?
What would you improve in the company/team/processes?
What would you get rid of from your job?

Don't focus only on a team; remember to talk about your teammates too! I'll make some notes on this topic later.