Check In
Level 2. Scores 26 to 50. Warm, well liked, and nothing changes between meetings.
Your one on ones are real meetings and your reports probably like them. That is the good news and it is also why this level is sticky. A check in feels supportive. People leave it feeling heard. What they do not leave with is a decision, an action, or a piece of feedback they would rather not have heard.
The pattern at this level is warmth without weight. You ask how things are going, you listen well, you mean it. Then the hard part, the feedback, the "I think you are avoiding this", the calibration on where they stand, slides to next time because the mood is good and there are eight minutes left.
Your dimension scores will tell you which half is missing. Check In leaders tend to score well on Cadence and Ownership and lower on Depth or Follow-through. If Depth is lowest, the meeting is not yet a place where people push back on you, and that means it is not yet a place where they tell you the uncomfortable thing either. If Follow-through is lowest, the meeting produces good conversation and nothing changes between meetings, which your reports notice before you do.
The nice one on one is the hardest to upgrade because nothing about it looks broken. The report likes it. You like it. Nobody asks you to change a meeting that feels good, so the hard sentence waits for a better week that never comes.
Here is what that costs them. A year later the feedback they never heard shows up anyway, in a review or in a conversation about whether the role still fits. That is not kindness. It is delaying the pain and taking away the year they could have used to fix it. Warm but firm gives them that year. The warmth is already there. Add the firm part.
What to do this week: the template below includes the energy question and one pushback prompt. Use the pushback prompt once per meeting: "Tell me where I have this wrong." Then wait. The first time, you will get "no, that is fair". The third time, you will get an answer, and that answer is the meeting starting to work.
Add the action log. Two lines at the bottom of your note: what they owe, what you owe, by when. Open it first next time. That single habit moves most Check In leaders into Working Session within a quarter.
Next step: read how pushback works as a signal, not a problem, in the 1:1 chapter of 5 Minute Leader.
Your 1:1 template
Every template starts with the same three blocks:
- Header block: name, cadence, slot, and the line that this is their meeting.
- The base agenda in the 40 / 40 / 20 split: their items, your items, the next step.
- The closing two lines: one action each, date of the next meeting.
Then one block for each dimension that scored 50 or below. Open this page from the link the tool gave you and the blocks that apply to you are marked; without scores, treat every block as optional and keep the one that matches your lowest bar.
- Cadence
Cadence block: a protect the slot rule, a four week cadence table, and the rule for what happens when the leader must move it (the report picks the new time, within the same week). - Ownership
Ownership block: three opening prompts for the report (What is on your mind, What is in your way, What do you need from me), and a one line rule that the leader speaks second. - Depth
Depth block: the energy question, one pushback prompt (Tell me where I have this wrong), and a line on the three pushback patterns the leader may meet. - Follow-through
Follow-through block: an action log with owner and date, and a last time we said opener.
Next step
The other results
- Status UpdateStatus meetings with a nicer name.
- Working SessionThings get decided. Nobody hears where they stand.
- CalibrationThe one on one most leaders describe and few run.
About this result
This is one of 4 results from the 1:1 Meeting Builder and Score, a free tool that shows the score without an email. Aggregate figures are at the statistics page once 30 completions have been reached. More free tools are at the tools shelf.