One of the most memorable challenges I faced as a PXer in a startup was when we had a leadership change, and our senior team decided to roll out OKRs to improve performance.
It was the first quarter, and one of our People Team objectives was to improve our managers' capabilities by increasing the utilisation of our performance management system.
My success was being measured by my ability to getting 75% of managers to use the 1:1 feature.
Being the nagging UX person I am, I asked, “What problem are we really trying to solve by getting more people to use this system?”
The official reason was “to help managers and employees align on performance expectations”. But quietly on the side, I was told the real problem was that the Employee Relations team was overwhelmed.
Leaders were raising underperformance issues far too late, with zero paper trail of previous conversations.
The real business problem wasn’t about paying for a tool that wasn’t being fully used. It was that managers weren’t taking responsibility for their teams or helping them meet expectations.
Instead, they waited until things got worse and then passed the problem to HR to fix.
A headache, one I'm sure many of you may have experienced.
The cost of focusing on the wrong problem
I don’t have anything against OKRs if they solve a real business problem.
But in this case, it felt like I was being handed a solution to implement that wouldn’t fix the issue.
Documenting 1:1s might make things easier for HR when problems arise, but would it actually prevent those problems from happening in the first place?
This isn’t the only time I’ve seen HR objectives focus on a process or operational pain point instead of a business problem. One of the most important things a People Team can do to have a greater impact is shift its goal focus:
- From HR problem: “Here is the solution to a pain point for HR, how quickly can we implement it?”
- To Business Problem: “What is causing lower levels of performance, and how do we increase it?”
Adoption is a useful metric to investigate how widespread a problem is, but for an OKR, a better metric would have been one that measured increased performance:
- Fewer last-minute escalations to HR
- Employees having a better understanding of what’s expected of them
- A drop in the number of formal performance improvement plans (PIPs).
How I increased adoption of 1:1s (as well as manager capability)
While I knew I was being measured on adoption… I also knew I had to do some discovery to understand how a lack of uptake of the 1:1 feature might be causing the real problem: underperformance.
When I looked at adoption metrics, I saw that about 40% of our managers were already having regular 1:1s with their teams. I called these the early adopters. The other 60% either avoided 1:1s or only had them with certain team members. I called these the late majority managers.
I set up interviews with late majority managers and asked how often they had 1:1s, what topics they covered, what stopped them from using the 1:1 feature, and what would help them have better 1:1 conversations.
Here’s what I found out about the late majority managers. They:
- Didn’t know what a “good” 1:1 should cover
- Felt awkward formalising conversations with senior team members
- Treated 1:1s as a casual catch-up over coffee or lunch
- Expected the employee to provide status updates
This left me with a problem statement I could solve: “How can we help our late majority managers have more effective 1:1 conversations?”
Step 2: test, learn & iterate with teams
Instead of rushing to roll out a templated guide based on industry best practice, I interviewed managers who were already having strong performance conversations:
- How do you structure your 1:1s?
- What signals tell you that performance is slipping?
- How do you set expectations with the most senior people in your team versus the junior team members?
- What do you find valuable about using the 1:1 feature to document conversations?
Unlike other managers, the early adopters saw 1:1s as a valuable way to build trust and clarity with their team members. They made sure the time spent was productive.
They let their team members lead the conversation, but always used the time to clarify expectations, align on goals, and offer support to remove blockers.
I took what these managers were already doing and turned it into a manager handbook with training, guidance, and templates for effective 1:1s. We included stories from our early adopters as case studies to show these approaches worked.
Our CEO announced the launch of the handbook, including a short example of how he structures and documents 1:1.
This helped set clear expectations. Our HR Business Partners then started checking in with managers who struggled with 1:1s, coaching them to try the handbook templates.
The best part? When it was time to review our progress on the team’s OKRs, I wasn’t just told I met expectations; I was told I exceeded them.
I’d solved the real problem and reduced not only the HR team’s workload but also the business costs associated with underperformance.
What is the business problem we’re actually trying to solve?
Next time you’re asked to roll out a solution, take a moment to investigate the business problem.
Encourage your team to measure the outcomes your business cares about, not just the activities that are easy to track.
Performance grows from quality conversations that create clarity, drive accountability, and help managers and employees work together to remove blockers.
Make sure your performance processes and systems are set up to support meaningful conversations, not just to drive adoption.
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