Ken Blanchard, author of the "One Minute Manager" Leadership series, once described Feedback as, "The Breakfast of Champions". And from where we're sitting, it seems as if a lot of managers are skipping breakfast!

Like a good healthy breakfast, giving or receiving constructive feedback can set us up for the day - giving us physical and mental energy.  But just like fitting in breakfast, we have to consciously make the time, forget the short cuts and resist the temptation of junk!!

Effective leaders not only give constructive feedback, they also seek and accept feedback about their own performance.  We have realised, through working with our clients, that when managers admit to "finding it hard to give feedback" what they really mean is that they find it hard to give ALL kinds of feedback - either the critical kind or the admiring kind.

For us, feedback is the oxygen in an organisation and when you fail to give feedback you're in effect suffocating your team!

So let's look a little bit more about how to give constructive feedback and the benefits it will bring.

For "Feedback Purists" there is no such thing as negative feedback - only successful or unsuccessful feedback.  To be successful, the receiver of feedback needs to at the very least listen properly to what you are saying and, preferably, act on what they are hearing.  And the responsibility for doing this rests with the person giving the feedback.  If you try to give feedback and the person "doesn't listen" then you're doing it wrong!

There are a number of simple steps you can follow to maximise your chance of being heard and we list these in our article Feedback:  The essential leadership tool (below).  The over-riding principle, however, is that Feedback is successful if the giver genuinely cares about the person they are feeding back to.  If feedback is given to score points or undermine another person, it cannot be called feedback - it's just old-fashioned criticism.

People learn just as much by repeating successful experiences as avoiding unsuccessful ones.  Therefore, we advise clients that they should observe the two thirds/one third rule:

• Two thirds of your feedback should be recognising the specifics of what someone has done right
• One third of your feedback can be about the specifics of what you would like someone to change

It is not about going around saying "Good Job" to everyone you meet.  Instead you need to be as specific with your "keep doing" feedback as you are when you give "stop doing" feedback.  So you might say to a colleague "Your introduction in the client presentation really got their attention - that was great and something we need to do with every client." This way your feedback clearly and unambiguously points to the successes and the benefits of a particular action and also provides guidance into the future.

So, giving constructive feedback:

• shows appreciation
• gives guidance for future actions
• motivates and encourages
• demonstrates caring and concern
• provides opportunities to learn and develop
• opens a door to open dialogue
• builds self-awareness
• develops trust

Pretty good reasons not to skip breakfast, don't you think??

Up

Attachments:

File	File type
Feedback An Essential Leadership Tool.pdf	PDF