“People are Key to success”, everyone says this and to some extent follows the required paradigms to ensure people are motivated and their interests are taken care. However I feel there has to be a specific agenda in place to execute initiatives such as people engagement and development of people.

One of the best ways to understand people and their aspirations is to meet them in person and conduct 1-on-1 meetings. The traditional approach of conducting Annual Appraisals and limiting it to only monitory corrections doest really help anymore. People are keen to know where the organisation is heading. What is the management plan for next few years? What is the career plan for each individual and how their growth is aligned in organisation? There are hundreds of such questions every ambitious employees has. The need today is to create a forum for such employees to come together and talk.

I think ‘1-on-1 meeting’ is very essential tool and first step towards knowing your people. It is an attempt to create opportunity for one to come up with new ideas and contribute to the final goal. Following 1-on-1 route, you boost confidence in people. They open up and give honest feedback on what is right and what is wrong. This shouldn’t be limited to one sided approach, it is to be aimed to collect feedback from individuals, and also communicate and clarify organisational goal.

‘1-on-1’ gives opportunity to establish due dates, timelines and significant events to determine ‘go’ and ‘no go’ decisions. These conversations go a long way in helping us to learn about each other. They are essential to team-building and creating meaningful long-term business as well as personal relationships. Every one must follow this at team level and there by at organisational level to make people happy and take organisation to next level of growth.

This is the heart and soul of development towards a larger goal. If you don’t have 1-on-1’s with your people, you are missing the primary tool for moving your people from good to great.