How to keep a running agenda for your one-on-one

Most one-on-ones are planned in the five minutes before they start. You open a blank document, try to remember what you wanted to raise, and come up with whatever happened today. The question you had on Monday, the small win from last week, and the concern you meant to mention all stay in the past.

A running agenda fixes this. It is a list you add to all week, so the meeting starts with everything that came up, not just what you remember.

Add items the moment they occur to you

The trick is capturing at the moment of thought, not at the moment of meeting. When something comes up that you want to raise with your manager or a report, write one line and tag it with their name:

ask Jen about the conference budget #1on1-jen
mention Ravi helped with the release #1on1-jen

A tag per person means you can pull up the list for any one-on-one in seconds. If you manage several people, use one tag per report.

With Jot, the line goes in with Ctrl + Shift + J and Ctrl + Enter, from whatever window you are in, so there is no reason to postpone it. Search in the app window (Ctrl + K) for the tag before the meeting and the agenda is waiting.

Sort the list before the meeting

Five minutes before, read the list and put it in order:

1. Decisions you need. These go first, because they are the reason to meet.
2. Problems or concerns. Better raised early than at minute 28.
3. Updates and wins. Short. Your manager can read most of these.
4. Questions about growth or the bigger picture. Often the most valuable, and the first to be dropped when time runs out. Protect at least one.

Delete anything that resolved itself during the week. That happens more than you would expect.

Take notes on outcomes, not discussion

During the meeting, write down only what changed: a decision, an action, a date. Discussion is easy to remember; outcomes are what get forgotten. The format in how to take notes in a one-on-one works well alongside a running agenda.

Carry forward what you did not cover

Anything you ran out of time for stays on the list for next time. If the same item carries forward three times, it is either not important or needs its own meeting. Decide which.

For managers

If you run one-on-ones with your team, encourage each person to keep their own running list and bring it. The meeting becomes theirs rather than a status update for you. You can keep a parallel list per person for feedback and recognition, captured when you notice it rather than reconstructed at review time.

Jot is on the Microsoft Store.

Jot is a quick-capture app for Windows: one hotkey, one line, back to what you were doing. What it is, or what is still unproven.