Same with myself. And I can say my best manager of all time was someone I wanted to have those talks with, because I learned so much from him. Half the time we would talk about work, the other half we would talk together on various philosophical subjects.

Because of those chats, he learned that I was a knowledge sponge and loved trying new things, and as a result he challenged me. I got to implement some really cool middle ware that became the bedrock of the middle office trading systems.

That said, I have had bad managers where the 1:1 is a forced chore. My experience isn’t that 1:1 are bad, but that they will quickly reveal the character of the manager. I do agree that if my manager is not great, it is often best if we interact little and I can go my own way. And yes, I am lucky to have had jobs like that where I can own my path.