[tobr]

I think you would miss a lot of important things with this approach. You’re basically asking other people to take the entire initiative to raise problems, which will only work for things they are 100% comfortable bringing up with you, and which they feel is in their interest for you to know about.

[benhurmarcel]

Exactly; my current manager works this way (no 1:1) and is surprised how in 3 years nobody has ever come willingly to talk about this stuff.

Nobody wants to be the one coming to his boss with problems; nobody wants to be the only team member to go talk about things that probably bother him given that he never asked about them.

Then obviously he has no idea about the day-to-day work that most of us do, the difficulties we're facing, the lack of motivation of some members, the career or personal aspirations of them, the growing idea of leaving the team of others…

If you never ask, there's a lot you'll never know. It doesn't need to be weekly, but you need to reserve some time at least every few months at the bare minimum.

[jevanish]

From Creativity Inc, by Pixar cofounder Ed Catmull:

“My door had always been open! I’d assumed that that would guarantee me a place in the loop, at least when it came to major sources of tension like this.

Not a single production manager had dropped by to express frustration or make a suggestion in the five years we worked on Toy Story.

…Being on the lookout for problems was not the same as seeing problems.”

Source: https://getlighthouse.com/blog/ed-catmull-quotes-leadership-...

[dsr_]

I suppose it's possible that I'm a terrible manager, but the actual situation is that the non-remote team members find ways to talk to me face-to-face three or four times a week apiece, and via private chats nearly as often.