293. The 1:1 Fix — How to Get Socially Reserved Team Members Talking

A manager dreads her 1:1s. Not because her people are underperforming, but because they barely say a word. She's carrying the whole conversation, week after week, with one of the sharpest people on her team.

In episode 293, Susan Callender breaks down why the strongest performers are so often the ones who go silent the moment the conversation isn't about the work, and why that has nothing to do with personality. Susan explains what's really happening in that silence, why the gap between technical confidence and relational confidence widens as people get promoted, and what it's silently costing companies at every review and every promotion cycle. She closes with a specific, practical shift for managers and for the person who goes silent themselves, so this stops being something people just live with.

In This Episode

- Why staying silent in a 1:1 is a learned behavior, not a fixed trait

- What's really happening internally when someone freezes instead of speaking up

- Why this pattern tends to get worse with seniority instead of better, and what that reveals about how confidence really works

- The real organizational cost of overlooking your most capable, least vocal people

- Three common manager fixes that don't work, and why

- Five practical shifts to close the gap, including a specific homework assignment for managers and for the person who goes silent

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