Leading with Intention: How to Give Effective Feedback
Last month, I was facilitating a virtual workshop with leaders about the importance of holding career conversations with their employees. We did a roleplay set-up in which the group acted as the manager, and I played the role of the employee: a Project Coordinator at a large IT firm, who needed feedback on her performance after missing an important deadline and submitting a project proposal with noticeable typos. (What can I say? Once an actress, always committed to a good HR roleplay scenario.) The feedback conversation for the scene appeared to be quite straightforward. And yet…
Three minutes into the roleplay, and the leaders — enthusiastic as they were — hadn’t delivered ANY feedback. As the group became further tangled in a knot of kindness, I stopped to ask: What’s going on? Their responses: I feel bad, I don’t want to hurt the employee’s feelings, it’s faster if I make the changes myself instead of giving feedback…and so on.
Feedback can be particularly hard for female leaders to give to their employees or peers. Kim Scott, the author of Radical Candor: Be a Kick-Ass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity, coined a great term for this phenomenon: “ruinous empathy” (which, side note, would make a great name for a band). Ruinous empathy is the approach in which we avoid talking about the issue for fear of hurting someone’s feelings — deciding it’s easier done ourselves rather than course correcting someone’s actions. Unfortunately, by skirting feedback, we are thwarting their ability to learn and grow. Scott’s book is a must-have for leaders who want to hold conversations with care and candor; her model outlines traps to avoid and where to focus our energy. Words to remember? “Care personally and challenge directly.”
Utilizing a radically candid approach can spur growth in your employees; the SBI feedback model, which has been shared on countless occasions, still holds first place in my eyes as a way to hold productive conversations. The SBI is simple, straightforward, and allows you to gently course correct and preserve autonomy in the process.
Situation: What’s going on? Anchor the time and place, e.g. I’d like to have a conversation about the project you handled last month on the topic of XYZ.
Behaviour: What was observed? E.g. You handed in the proposal three days past our agreed-upon deadline. There were also a number of typos, particularly in the mid-section pertaining to our numbers, and the financial documentation was excluded from this version. Practice focusing on observable facts, and avoid assumptions like the plague.
Impact: What effect does this have — on the leader, the team, the business? Be specific, e.g. This incident has had notable repercussions on the business, such as losing a client (etc.)
And here is the most important step, which leaders often neglect…
Pause and Pivot: Take a moment to pause during the conversation, and switch from telling to asking. This is the time to get their perspective and engage in a two-way conversation, rather than a one-way critique. E.g. This is what I observed; what is your perspective?
Acknowledge their perspective and then book-end the conversation. Follow up with some open-ended questions and agree on next steps together:
What do you need to be successful in your role?
Here is what I would like to see…
The same goes for positive feedback; you can book-end by asking the same questions. If you want your employees to thrive, you need to hold intentional, directional conversations about their performance: good and bad. And you need to hold space for these conversations on a regular basis.
Successful leaders demonstrate empathy, interest, and understanding in their staff — always — not just when people are soaring or sinking. And keep in mind: your high performers may not always look like they need feedback, but everyone appreciates acknowledgment. As I mentioned in my last article: according to the McKinsey report, people most often left organizations due to a lack of belonging (51%) and feeling undervalued (52%). Create an environment in which people want to stay and flourish, rather than flee.
With joy,
