6 Templates for Managers

Effective communication and structured processes are cornerstones of successful team management. As an HR professional or people manager, having the right tools at your disposal can streamline key conversations and ensure productive outcomes for your team.

We've compiled a variety of ready-to-use templates tailored to help managers foster collaboration and drive results. Whether you're preparing for a salary negotiation, looking for the perfect questions to deepen employee engagement in one-on-one meetings, or setting the agenda for a constructive feedback session, these resources are designed to support you and your team every step of the way.

Salary Negotiation Template

This salary negotiation template helps prepare managers for salary negotiations with employees, including discussion prompts and scripts for responding to sensitive requests.

The salary negotiation template provides these key benefits for teams like yours:

1. Guides sensitive conversations with confidence: Salary discussions can be delicate and emotionally charged. This template provides managers with clear, structured language and approaches to address employee concerns tactfully and professionally, ensuring conversations remain productive and respectful.
2. Promotes fairness and transparency: By offering guidance on explaining salary bands, pay disparities, and HR processes, the template helps managers navigate complex topics, fostering trust and understanding among team members.
3. Equips managers to advocate for employees: The template encourages managers to act as advocates for their employees, providing tools to gather evidence, document merit, and escalate concerns to HR effectively.
4. Saves time with ready-to-use scripts: With pre-written conversation starters and sample responses for various scenarios, managers can save time preparing for salary discussions and focus on addressing employee needs and concerns.

Probation Review Template

Probation reviews don’t have to be scary — this probation review template helps employers take a people-first approach to assess whether a new hire is the right fit for their team.

The probation review template provides these key benefits for teams like yours:

1. Ensures comprehensive evaluation: This template provides a structured framework for assessing new hires at key milestones, ensuring managers cover all critical areas—performance, growth, feedback, and improvement plans—during the probationary period.
2. Supports transparent communication: By facilitating open discussions about expectations, experiences, and future objectives, the template encourages mutual understanding and trust between managers and employees.
3. Streamlines decision-making: With clear guidelines for assessing probation outcomes, such as confirmation, extension, or termination, the template helps managers make informed and legally compliant decisions.
4. Promotes continuous development: The template not only evaluates current performance but also helps identify training needs, set goals for future growth, and establish a roadmap for success beyond the probationary period.

Remote One-on-One Agenda Questions Bank

Using this remote one-on-one agenda question bank, managers can tailor their one-on-one agendas to get at the issues unique to long-distance work relationships.

This remote one-on-one agenda question bank provides these key benefits for teams like yours:

1. Facilitates deeper employee connections: The question bank helps managers foster meaningful conversations with remote employees, addressing feelings of isolation and ensuring they feel supported, heard, and connected to their team.
2. Addresses unique remote work challenges: By focusing on topics like work-life balance, caregiving needs, and logistical barriers, the template equips managers to identify and resolve obstacles specific to remote work environments.
3. Encourages clarity and alignment: The questions help managers check in on priorities, goals, and project roadblocks, ensuring remote employees remain aligned with team objectives and organizational expectations.
4. Promotes employee wellbeing: By asking about stress levels, mental health, and energy, the agenda enables managers to proactively support their employees' overall wellbeing, leading to a more engaged and productive team.

Manager One-on-One Agenda Questions Bank

Managers and employees should meet once a week to discuss priorities, obstacles, development, and other important topics. Leaders can use the manager one-on-one agenda question bank to get the conversation started.

This manager one-on-one questions bank provides these key benefits:

1. Strengthens employee-manager relationships: The template provides a structured framework for open, meaningful conversations, helping managers build trust and deeper connections with their team members.
2. Encourages goal alignment and accountability: By addressing weekly priorities, long-term goals, and progress, the template ensures employees and managers stay aligned and focused on achieving both personal and organizational objectives.
3. Supports career growth and development: With dedicated questions about learning opportunities and professional aspirations, the template empowers managers to guide employees toward meaningful career development and satisfaction.
4. Drives continuous improvement: The template promotes feedback loops, encouraging employees to share suggestions for team collaboration, company improvement, and how managers can better support them, fostering a culture of growth and innovation.

Weekly Team Updates Template

Asking direct reports to provide you with written status updates at the end of each week can help you stay on top of progress and identify roadblocks. Use this weekly team updates template to keep everyone updated on the latest.

This weekly team updates template provides these key benefits:

1. Enhances visibility into work progress: The template helps managers stay informed about team members’ priorities, accomplishments, and challenges without micromanaging, ensuring a clear picture of ongoing work.
2. Identifies and resolves roadblocks early: By prompting employees to highlight obstacles, the template enables managers to step in and provide support before issues escalate or delay progress.
3. Promotes consistent communication: Regular updates foster a habit of structured, transparent communication, creating a reliable feedback loop between managers and their team.
4. Tracks team sentiment and wellbeing: With a built-in check-in on how employees are feeling, the template empowers managers to monitor morale and address concerns that may impact productivity or engagement.

Constructive Feedback Agenda Template‍

Having regular one-on-one conversations between managers and employees is essential to maintaining an open line of communication about job performance and happiness. This constructive feedback agenda template helps teams deliver clear and helpful feedback.

This constructive feedback agenda template provides these key benefits for teams like yours:

1. Provides a clear framework for tough conversations: The template ensures that feedback discussions are structured, purposeful, and focused, helping managers navigate challenging topics with confidence.
2. Encourages specific and actionable feedback: By emphasizing observed behaviors and their impact, the template helps managers avoid vague criticism and offer constructive insights that employees can act on.
3. Fosters open dialogue: The inclusion of a space for employee responses encourages two-way communication, allowing employees to share their perspective and feel heard.
4. Drives accountability and continuous improvement: The template promotes solution-focused conversations, reinforces follow-ups in one-on-ones, and ensures feedback translates into meaningful progress over time.

Improving Manager Effectiveness With Lattice

We hope these templates offer a useful starting point as you begin to standardize and improve manager effectiveness at your organization. As you grow your managers in their careers, you simultaneously grow your organization's potential.

If you’d like to learn more about how the Lattice platform can help you manage your people and their performance, we’d love to chat. Request a demo today.