Help. DR don't seem interested. Am I spinning my wheels?

It definitely takes some people longer. Some never get comfortable with talking about personal stuff - they just use this as their time to talk about work. Nothing wrong with that.

If they've been through fads and then abandoned, it will take even longer. When they see (over time) that you are genuinely interested in their success, they will come around.

The key here is consistency. Given the history, YOU MUST HAVE THE O3's every week, all year long. They have to see that it's not a fad for you, that it's the way you manage.

It takes time.

John

PS: There are people who are simply not good at eye contact. Don't read too much into it for now.

It takes as long as it takes. They're not that dumb right? So, if there have been aborted attempts at "new" things in the past, they'd be dumb to just dive right in again.

And just clarify. The first 10 minutes are for them to talk about what they want to talk about with you.

Then during the week, if they're talking to you about stuff that could be held until the O3, point that out.

Did you use M&M's announcement email? That's a nice intro.

As manager, I would take the first step and do an "intro" -- dive into your background, history, successes, failures, family, etc.

If you show some vulnerability/honesty, it'll go a long way.

BLUF: Some people will take longer to engage. You really don't care about the reason - don't be their psychologist. Do your part to engage them and be trustworthy. Give them feedback on the effect of not engaging if it continues.

I manage software developers, testers, etc. Many are very high C's. I originally felt like I had to keep it going for 30 minutes. My coach told me no. The other person is also responsible for establishing the relationship. I take the lead. I make it safe for them to talk. I provide open ended questions. I provide consistent, fair behavior.

But they have to take some responsibility for engaging me as well. What ever bad things happened in the past, they have to move on and reach back to me. After 3 months, I gave a few feedback that their not participating in the conversation made it harder for me to help them in their career. These people also were very quiet with co-workers and I gave them feedback that constant silence affected their impact on the team.

MsSunshine - you said you use a coach. Do you use management coach?

I started by talking about me. I seem to be able to do that for hours! LOL

Once we got some trust established, it just started to flow. Directs just seem to talk and talk. It's about trust. They don't trust you yet. As connick said, "If you show some vulnerability/honesty, it'll go a long way."

I also have come to the conclusion that it's alright to end the O3 earlier if we are all talked out. I have done that exactly 2 times in the last 1.5 years. Once was when a direct and myself were working on a project together for about 4 days side by side. As we worked, we effectively had chain O3's and were completely talked out by the time the official O3 happened. The other time was with one of my more quiet directs. She was simply not in the mood to talk. I found out in our next O3 that she was a bit sad about something at home and needed time to mull it over.

My advise is to stop treating it like a duty (I made that mistake. I once told a direct that I was "Supposed" to ask about their kids...What a knucklehead!) and start treating it like something to look forward to.

I just recently have a management coach assigned by my company that I meet with every other week. I find her very valuable for lots of reasons and would highly recommend having one if your company gives the opportunity. I do appreciate and find the advice I get here useful too :) but being right there in person she notices things I won't ask about. She thought all the things with 03's, feedback, coaching and delegation I've been working on from MT were great. She was impressed by my goals based on the MT model but did help me make them a little tighter - still learning :lol:. She did say that she usually had to spend more time working on goals with people. (The scary thing was that up until then I thought I had good goals and the other managers thought I had the best ones they'd seen.)

The difference is more about insights into things I don't ask about or pulling things together. For example, when I had given the same feedback a handful of times, I needed to ratchet up the seriousness. Or that several things that were happening were symptoms of a basic tendency I have to try to hard - making it too easy for others to not hold up their end and thus not learn from it - or lose perspective and not step back to re-evaluate.