Job Aid

The Rituals of Management

Every manager has the same meetings on the calendar—a one-on-one, a team meeting, a performance review. Some build trust. Others feel like a box to check. Drawing on Michael Norton's research on ritual, this job aid shows what separates a habit from a ritual (meaning, emotion, intention) and walks through four core manager conversations—the one-on-one, the team meeting, performance conversations, and the career conversation—naming the job each one does and the feeling it should leave behind.