OK, that might not sound like much of a present I agree. But hold fire and I’ll explain why a good knowledge of how to give feedback is a must-have gift for your business.
Why people love receiving feedback but hate giving it
Do you wring your hands when it comes to telling people exactly how it is? Or, maybe you’re very direct and people shut down when you tell them things – so you’ve given up?
Perhaps surprisingly, there’s a whole heap of research that shows employees are hungry for feedback, especially of the constructive variety, that is when the feedback isn’t praise. So you can take from this that your staff genuinely want you to help them understand which areas they can improve in…after all, people generally want to do a good job.
However, there’s also research showing that people want to receive constructive feedback they don’t want to have to dish it out.
Chart showing that no one likes to give negative feedback, but everyone wants to hear it. This can be resolved by learning how to give feedback effectively.
It’s understandable, I mean it can be pretty awkward, right?
Well, not necessarily. With the right strategies in place and a little practise you’ll find both parties can get a lot out of the process of feedback, making learning how to give feedback effectively a gamechanger for your business.
Let’s look at how this works in practice
Kate, one of your subordinates, is distracting people when she checks her phone in the management meeting. But you don’t tell her because she’s been putting in all these extra hours this month. You don’t want to be all negative. So, Kate is none the wiser.
Who benefits from this? Not Kate. Not you. And the rest of the team have started rolling their eyes at her.
Better to put your brave pants on and address the situation.
I spend a good deal of time helping my clients grease the wheels of giving and receiving feedback in a mindful and effective way.
Having an effective feedback conversation
If people feel safe in the team, they are more likely to seek out and give feedback.
I use a simple acronym to structure a feedback conversation. There are several variations online (no idea who created it so impossible to attribute) but this one is tried and tested (by me and lots of our clients).
It’s the AID model.
Action (what is the specific thing you’ve noticed)
Impact (what impact is it having – on you, the team, the business, your customers)
Desired Outcome (what you’d like to have happen)
And you’ll want to use it for giving praise too. In fact, this is a good place to start.
| Action:
I noticed that….. |
…the sales training you ran for internal staff was very clearly presented. |
| Impact:
I felt ….. |
….you delivered it at a crucial time and I’ve already seen an impact on sales this month. |
| Desired Outcome:
I’d like you to…… |
….. deliver these sessions to all departments this year. |
| In what way could you….. |
I hope you accept my gift and start using it as soon as possible. You never know – your team might start giving you the gift of feedback in return. Are you up for it?