To stop being nice to line manager

[Lemonsugarhigh]

My line manager is fine but I absolutely dread our fortnightly '1 on 1s' because they're so tedious and a waste of my time. (Both of us feel the same I should think).

There are no line management requirements at my company, other than to meet regularly with whoever you line manage. So she doesn't discuss performance, work, training, career progression, or anything. They're just a 'catch-up' during which I have nothing to say to her because we both work remotely on different projects and have nothing in common. The conversation tends to focus on her and her 18 month old baby for 30 minutes, and whatever illness/teething/separation anxiety it's been dealing with that week. During which I have to smile sweetly to the camera and pretend to be deeply interested. I have nothing to say really and often barely speak during these meetings. Work is fine, my personal life is uneventful and also fine, and also nothing to do with her.

Do you think it would be OK to question the point of these meetings, tell her I don't find them useful, and ask for them to be monthly? Or even quarterly?

Why don't you bring up training or career progression, then? It would give her something to talk about, rather than have to fill her required meetings (as it's going to be in her objectives for the year to meet with you regularly) with chat.

She's your line manager. It's literally her job and you're seemingly refusing to engage with her about your role.

Can’t you make them more work-focused? Ask her about company financial performance and current priorities and how the projects you are working on support these? Ask what new projects are coming down the pipeline. If she’s your line manager presumably she assigns your work?

Also be proactive about identifying for yourself what training/resources would be helpful and discuss with her how these can be provided.

if that doesn’t work, can you cut the meetings down to 5 mins so she can tick the box to say they have happened. It neither of you waste any time on it. In our company, the frequency of 121s are monitored by HR and are a management KPI so she probably can’t just unilaterally agree to change them to quarterly.

Fortnightly seems a bit much. Why not suggest that since the last X meetings haven't had and concrete objectives or training outcomes you'd like to reduce the frequency to every Y.

@NeverDropYourMooncup There is no training or career progression where I work. You have to take that kind of thing on yourself (which I have done).

I could have written this except mine are weekly and last about 45 mins. My manager just runs a monologue about her child, her new extension, her family, her.. Her.. Her... I sometimes wonder if she'd notice if I wasn't there! If I try to say anything work related she dismisses it and goes back to her favourite subject. It's the most painful 45 minutes of my week. This week I'm claiming a headache and not attending. I try and miss at least one in three.

What do you take to the meetings? Updates on projects, things of professional interest, your own CPD? It should be a joint agenda so if there’s nothing to talk about you have some responsibility for that too. Having some 1:1 time with your manager can be great for focussing your career development, if you use the time well.

I do monthly with my team as it’s a real period of change for us. One colleague I have issues around performance that I’m monitoring without official steps at this point I meet with fortnightly. But I speak to them all most days as they run stuff by me (trying to build their confidence and independence but I’m new to them and they’re learning my approaches to things). Sounds like your line manager knows she needs to do them but doesn’t understand why. Can you send a suggested agenda to give it more structure?

I meet with my line manager weekly and I always have an agenda prepared of things I want to update her about or ask her. Perhaps she expects you to do the same? It's pretty much standard in my industry and considered as your opportunity to self-promote and/or get useful information. Why don't you do the same?

This post sums up a ‘MN person’ imo

In what way is she your manager if she isn't responsible for your performance and progression? What's the point? Who decides if you're performing well or will progress?

I would definitely request they drop to a month. Who put in place the rule they have to happen fortnightly and what have they said is the required agenda? It surely isn't in anyone's interests to have a forced chat about nothing on work time.

How did she become a manager, then?

Is it a role where they specialise in parachuting experienced and qualified individuals from outside the organisation in?

Do they know you've done this training? Have you updated them at all?

Otherwise, she's faced with a meeting rather like my mother trying to get information out of me about primary school;

'How was school?' Fine.

'What did you do at school today?' Nothing.

'What did you have for lunch?' Can't remember.

'Do you have any homework?' No.

'Are there any letters?' No.

'What are you doing tomorrow?' Dunno.

Take charge of the meeting - I always have a list of things I want to talk about and my manager is going to listen to this no matter what. As your manager is she responsible for your performance - use this time to fly your own flag as it were and tell her what you are doing to progress your career & training. Sometimes they digress to what is happening in the company.

Well yeah of course, beacuse I AM a MN poster... thank you for your super valuable insight😅

I go to my meeting with a list of things I want to go through as otherwise we tend to go off track (although I genuinely like my line manager and feel glad we talk about our lives outside work)

Same with the people I line manage.

But I can see that is trickier if there isn't really anything to go over due to the nature of your roles.

Are there things you would find it helpful to discuss with her?

Thanks @booksandbeans and @NeverDropYourMooncup I'll just go to the next one this week and ask for what I want from the sessions going forward. The thing is I'm looking for some direction with career/professional development but the company culture is to put that on the staff member. The response is always 'oh that sounds great, you go and find a course/training etc you want to do and we'll support you' when realistically there's not really a random course we can take to progress our careers in my industry. We need to be working on different projects/getting different experiences.

If there is no training, no career progression and your LM doesn't have any investment in your development, activities and deliverables, then the first thing I would do is start looking for a new job in a different company.

It is unusual for there to be absolutely no investment in people, most companies nowadays have initiatives to develop their workforce, to increase the viability of the business. So yours is unusual and not worth investing your career on.

in the meantime... as has already been suggested, have an agenda of things you want to cover to update your manager on, progress by initiative including issues you're facing, and solutions you can run by your LM to get her views and advice.

if the conversation strays onto personal matters, politely highlight that you have a list of things to cover "so can we please stay on topic so I can cover everything I need to".

YANBU

I’d send her an email (and perhaps CC your manager in) and say that for the past few meetings we’ve not had anything work related to talk about and so you’re wondering if it’s ok to move them to monthly meetings instead. And if there’s anything either of you need to speak about in the meantime then you can arrange extra meetings.

I do 1 to 1s. It can be difficult if people have nothing to say. I tend to go armed with a list of work-related discussion points. Tough in your position from what you've said, though

Even if you're on different projects, how come You're not updating her on progress? If she's your manager she's still responsible for its outcome so it's in her interest that's it's going well.

This. Surely there are work related things to discuss. I don't see the point of these meetings otherwise. I'd just talk about what your working on, etc

In what way is she your manager if she isn't responsible for your performance and progression? What's the point? Who decides if you're performing well or will progress?

I was wondering this too. It’s all good and well being completely autonomous with a manager who you never speak to until it comes to them making a decision you don’t agree with re your role. I speak from bitter experience here. Got on perfectly until I got a grading that I felt misrepresented my work - not only was I annoyed because my manager didn’t know my work, but because I hadn’t the faintest grasp on her personality it was impossible to work out why what had happened had happened.

If this person has any decision-making authority over you whatsoever you need a relationship with her. I think that’s what these meetings are. If they aren’t useful, try and rework them so that they are or propose a quick fifteen minute check-in each week. But do not devalue either the contact or having a line manager who understands its importance.

I’d consider dropping to monthly.

But this sounds a weird set up. Your LM sounds useless and like she doesn’t know what these meetings are for either. I think you def need to take more control of them. Have an agenda. Go in with structure and topics to talk about. Make them specific. For example: draft some objectives for yourself and ask your LM to review them with you and sign them off. Find a training course and ask your LM to check the curriculum looks valid and to approve the costs or whatever.

the company culture is to put that on the staff member. The response is always 'oh that sounds great, you go and find a course/training etc you want to do and we'll support you'

A company can expect staff to be self starting and take personal responsibility for finding training opportunities. Just because they do this and don’t offer in house training, doesn’t mean your LM shouldn’t be talking to you about career development.

If they say you should find a training course, then do that. It’s not up to your LM to find them for you. But you CAN then ask your LM for feedback on whether the course looks appropriate.

Take control.

If LM continues to be useless and divert conversation back to herself, ask HER manager for a call and raise the issue. It’s perfectly normal to have a “skip level” meeting occasionally with your LM’s LM so don’t feel like that is a weird thing to do.

I would take control of these meetings yourself by writing the agenda with work related items of your choosing and send it out to her in advance of the meeting. Then in the meeting insist on working through the agenda methodically.

If she starts wiffling away about herself just keep changing the subject back to those agenda points.

It may feel rude at first but honestly it's the only way to deal with people like this.

I'd just ask your LM if you can switch to a monthly call as you don't need it weekly and can use the time better.