How Do I Give Kick-Ass Feedback?

I love this story about feedback by Kim Scott, a professional coach for tech companies like Twitter and Qualtrics, because it’s a perfect example of the nuances of feedback. 

Previously in her professional career, Scott worked unde Sheryl Sandberg, the Chief Operating Officer of Google. While in her role at Google, Scott delivered an important presentation about Google’s AdSense business to Larry Page and Sergey Brin (the co-founders of Google) and Eric Schmidt (the CEO of Google from 2001-2011) that Sandberg sat in on. During the presentation, Scott explained the success of AdSense and how it would continue to benefit Google in the future. Afterwards, Scott felt triumphant, having impressed the business leaders with the information she presented. 

However, this success was bittersweet. 

Sandberg, having listened to the entire presentation, took Scott on a walk shortly after the conclusion of the presentation. 

During their walk, Sandberg congratulated Scott on her success, while noting that Scott used the word “um” a lot during her speech. Sandberg continued to mention the conversation fillers and how they deterred the presentation, but Scott was not listening. Scott was over the moon about impressing the CEO and co-founders of Google. Not catching the hint, Sandberg even offered to get Scott a speaking coach to help her improve her stature as a presentator–an offer that Scott brushed aside. Eventually, Sandberg tried something different–a method called “radical candor”.

Knowing that her point was not getting across, Sandberg told Scott that she sounded stupid. 

Although the advice was harsh and blunt, Scott got the message loud and clear. 

Sandberg was trying to explain that by saying “um” every third or fourth word, Scott was taking away from the power of her presentation, and her professional image as an employee of Google. As an industry leader, Sandberg wanted to see her team member excel in her field and improve her abilities–and saw the issue in speech as a setback to Scott’s career.

Instead of letting it slide by, Sandberg took a different approach to the problem and ultimately helped Scott take the next step towards professional and personal success. By correcting habitual speaking habits, Sandberg prepared Scott for a future of presentations, lectures and speeches–adding to her professional development and growth as a leader. Scott knew this, and said that making efforts to improve team members with techniques such as “radical candor” made Sheryl Sandberg such a great boss. 

This story illustrates the importance of leadership, and how true leaders not only challenge their employees to elevate their abilities, but care about them enough to help them achieve those goals. This type of concern is also the basis for feedback.

THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT THE F WORD

When the word feedback comes to mind, the first thing it is associated with are critiques, employee evaluations or performance reviews. Feedback is inherently tied with a negative connotation, partially due to the media portrayal of feedback as a way to chastise employees for sub-par performances. 

(If you’ve ever seen The Devil Wears Prada, you know exactly what we’re talking about). 

However, this is not what real feedback is. Feedback is a great opportunity for leaders to share their resources and concern for their employees in a way that can make them better. Feedback is an honest, open communication between two parties. Feedback is frequent, on-going, and always focused on moving forward.

Only thinking about the negative aspects of feedback fails to show the growth and nurturing care that many leaders give their teams through this important exchange. 

5 TIPS FOR DELIVERING FEEDBACK 

With that in mind, here are a few of our favorite tips to improve the way you deliver and engage in feedback:  

1. Convey positive intent.

Step one is truly about stating your desired outcome for the conversation. You really need to think about what do I want for myself, what do I want for this person, and what do I want for the work? The next question to ask yourself is: If I really wanted these things to happen: How should I show up? Remember, this feedback is meant to help someone and set them up for success. 

2. Provide a clear, specific, accurate description of the situation.

When giving feedback, it’s important to be as clear and specific as possible. It’s also important to isolate the situation to one moment in time or task, avoiding sweeping statements like “every time or every task.” 

3. Describe the specific behaviors you observed.

The important thing to do in this step is to simply name the behavior using neutral language and not label the behavior. For example, saying “You missed the deadline” is different than saying “You irresponsibly missed the deadline.” The latter is called labeling. This step is about naming the behavior that you either want to reinforce or redirect so the employee can recall their performance. 

4. Communicate the impact of their behavior on you, others, and on the work itself.

Now is the time to share the impact of the action. Without the impact, feedback is just an opinion. So using the example above, the feedback could be something like instead of "you missed the deadline and that's unacceptable" you could try “"when we miss that deadline, we lose credibility with that cross-functional team and we hold up other mission critical tasks on the project." And then you would ask a question. Something like: "What's the best way for us to have a solutions-focused conversation about this?"

5. Involve them in the communication by getting their input.

Is there an explanation? Is this situation frequent? There are many outside factors that can affect performance, and by getting input from an employee during feedback you can get a better understanding of where their head is at. Involving them is critical because it is an adult-adult, human-human conversation. When you involve others you demonstrate that you are curious about their POV and you might even learn something new about the contributing factors. The biggest thing is that you catapult them to a place of buy for the way forward when they are involved in the solution.

Although these are just a few tips, the art of feedback is complicated and often involves honest communication. By opening yourself up to having those difficult or awkward conversations, you’re allowing your team members the chance to become stronger performers–in both their careers and their personal lives.

HOW TO ACTIVATE YOUR BEST FEEDBACK YET

If you’re looking for an opportunity to practice giving and receiving feedback, including the chance to test out your skills within a supportive group coaching environment, be sure to check out Leadology’s new eight-week new manager online coaching program, Activate.

By Team Leadology