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Comment by djhope99 | Hacker News Reader

“I don’t do 1-on-1s, and almost everything I say, I say to everybody all the time. I don’t really believe there’s any information that I operate on that only one or two people should hear about… I believe that when you give everybody equal access to information, that empowers people. And so that’s number one… Number two, if the CEO’s direct staff is 60 people, the number of layers you’ve removed in a company is probably something like seven.”

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I think this statement is really missing the point of 1-on-1's. They should be time set aside for the employee to talk about whatever is on their mind. It is ideally an opportunity for them to bring up any issues or concerns they might be having but is either unsuitable to or they are uncomfortable bringing it up with the larger group. Often the response is indeed, "Thanks for letting me know, I'll communicate that to the team." but it would have never been brought up if that time wasn't set aside to chat.

Sure, when you are directly reporting into the CEO you are probably in a position where you are expected to lead it out yourself unless it affects the entire company strategy, so it is less useful, but if you are working with ICs then they are still very useful.

The link seems to address that concern. It reads to me as if the view is that if the concern can't be shared with the group then it needn't be shared at all. Discussing it in the group benefits everyone because everyone can hear the concern and the response to it.

There definitely are concerns which shouldn't / don't need to be shared widely, when they're about specific people or about interpersonal issues. There's also potentially lots of stuff that should be communicated to the team, but they don't need to know the details of the issues. You definitely don't want to start a "John is avoiding work recently" conversation in a group, exactly because everyone can hear it and respond to it. Maybe the manager needs to have a private chat with him, or maybe the manager already knows that John had a death in the family that affects him. Not everything needs to have more people involved.

Which is an extremely naive view. Some concerns are sensitive.

yes.. but they often concern more then one people...

discussing it public does not necessary means in front of all 60 people but in front of the people relevant to the discussion..

It very well could be a discussing with just one or two subordinates and their teams..

Also he never said he does not have individual meetings to discuss individual concerns.. but those should happen seldomly as needed and not by a mandated weekly schedule..

If you listened to his response it was very much centered on his communication whether he intended it that way or not.

I guess I should have elaborated more about the ICs. With experienced employees they should know how to provide feedback to a larger group, but you don't necessarily have that with junior or intermediate ICs who don't always have the confidence to say anything if you didn't provide them with a space to provide feedback or just have a complaining session.

It can also be just the possibility that feedback could be taken as personally attacking someone in a group setting. How does someone differentiate between general feedback and passive aggressive feedback singling them out? For someone that may not "fit in" with the group they are part of it is a real concern they have to consider. I can think of many examples where this is the case where the suitable action is to either give or receive feedback in a more private environment.

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