Skip Level Meetings: A Guide for Managers
As you advance in your career, you won’t be as involved in the day-to-day activities and it can be harder to get a true sense of how your team is feeling. This is particularly true as you begin to manage managers and you’re a bit farther removed from directly working with some people in the organization.
I’ve shared many different strategies to get engaged feedback from your team and here’s one to add to your tool kit: a skip level meeting.
A skip level meeting is when a higher level manager meets with employees who report to people they manage or others on their team who don’t report directly to them. The goal is generally to create open lines of communication with the higher level manager and get insights on what’s happening in the organization at all levels. It can also be to understand how managers are doing. The meeting can be 1:1 or in group settings.
Though my full team of nearly 40 and I meet monthly, there’s nothing quite like connecting in smaller group settings to give everyone a chance to offer feedback and ask questions. It’s feeling especially meaningful right now when there aren’t chances for hallway conversations.
Here’s how to set up successful skip level meetings in your organization.
Determine the structure
Determine the right framework based on the size of your team and individual personalities. You may realize that 1:1 conversations with everyone is a better way to connect.
Clarify expectations
Tell everyone up front what you plan to do, including your managers, so people understand what you want to accomplish. It can be nerve-wracking for some people to meet with the boss and you want to provide transparency on the goals and structure of the time together.
Prepare in advance
Prepare questions to ask—and be open to the direction the conversation goes. I send a list of questions to review in advance and I’ll include a link to the full list of questions I’ve used in the show notes. You’ll want to start with warm-up questions to get the conversation flowing. I’ve been asking about favorite podcasts and restaurants for takeout. Then you can transition into more specific questions about the organization. Here are two of my favorites: What is something the team is doing really well right now? What are the barriers or bottlenecks you’re experiencing? I’ve allotted 45 mins to an hour for the small group conversations I’ve been doing, which feels like a perfect amount of time. You can adjust to less time for 1:1. Close the meeting by clarifying who is accountable for what afterward. If something came up they promised to share more about or send to you, remind everyone of that. As the leader, you’re accountable for following up with them in some way for anything they shared they need help with or more information on. Your follow through as a leader will determine whether they feel they can come to you again with things they need. Even if you can’t change everything they asked about, make sure they feel heard and acknowledged.
Keep notes
I recommend keeping notes from these conversations that you can refer back to in coming weeks or months. This will help you see how the team has been able to make progress. After all, this is all about helping to move the team forward.
If you don’t manage a team yourself, this is a framework you could use to suggest to your boss and boss’ boss to explore how to stay connected in this virtual world. Though it may feel uncomfortable to ask for something like this, remember that advocating for yourself and your colleagues is a bold move, too.
Your One Bold Move: Schedule a skip level meeting to get broader insights into the organization and what your team needs from you.
10 Questions You Can Use For Your Next Skip Level Meeting:
1. Start with an opening question to get people comfortable talking. I’ve used
What’s your favorite podcast/book that you’ve listened to or read recently?
What’s your favorite restaurant for takeout?
2. What do you need more of to be successful in your role?
3. What do you need less of to be successful in your role?
4. If you were in charge of the team, what’s something you would do differently and why?
5. What’s the biggest barrier or bottleneck for your team to do their jobs well?
6. What do you think the team does really well?
7. What are your biggest worries or concerns?
8. What questions (even the difficult ones!) do you have for me?
9. What are you accountable to do after this meeting?
10. What am I accountable to do after this meeting?
Also available on One Bold Move A Day podcast, Episode 98.
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Messy.fm.
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