You’ve acknowledged to yourself that you recoil from giving critical feedback to employees. Whether this stems from a desire to avoid workplace conflict, a lack of confidence in your communication style or concerns over doubting your opinion post-feedback, you would like to improve for your own sake, and for the sake of your employees. After all, they are relying on you as their manager to guide their work performance in order to succeed at their career goals. How to proceed?
Try this: First, clarify your motives. What is the problem and why do you want to communicate about it? Next, think about how to communicate this in a way the other person can receive. I know a lot of people recommend “sandwiching” the constructive criticism between positive statements (it’s called a “feedback sandwich”). Personally, I’ve never liked that method, because I view it as trying to be a people pleaser while also trying to give constructive criticism. Interestingly, others agree (and there are studies which back this up) that most people receiving the “sandwich” don’t even hear the negative feedback “sandwiched” between the positives —they just walk away with the impression they are doing great. I’ve even heard this method referred to as the “sh*t sandwich“!
If we think about this, the reasons for sandwiching criticism between positive statements includes: (1) the feedback giver is afraid of giving criticism and so tries to soft-pedal; (2) the feedback giver doesn’t have a good relationship with the other person and feels the need to say something nice (see the soft-pedaling comment); or (3) the feedback giver doesn’t regularly acknowledge the positive (so feels like they must when delivering constructive criticism — see soft-pedaling).
Here are some tips* to give better, authentic feedback in a way that gets positive results:
- Clearly and objectively describe the behavior. Here, you are delivering data, not emotions, not how you were embarrassed, and not how they should have known. This is straight-forward, objective and devoid of adjectives.
- Describe the impact the behavior or performance is having on the goal, the team, the operation. People need to understand why they need to do something differently.
- Encourage questions and clarifications. Believe it or not, most people try to do a good job and if they aren’t doing a good job, it’s because they didn’t know they weren’t doing a good job. Remember the statement, “We don’t know who discovered the water, but we’re pretty sure it wasn’t a fish”? It’s actually true. We often don’t see our own faults unless someone has the courage to point them out to us. If your employee hasn’t realized this before the feedback, they’ll have questions.
- Actively listen to the reaction to your feedback. If they own it, stop talking about what happened and start talking about what to do differently.
- Problem solve how to do it differently in the future. Let the employee come up with suggestions. This will increase ownership. If they need help, resources, or supplies, support him or her in developing a solution or plan for moving forward. Make sure it is clear what the goal is and what the steps are to achieving the goal going forward.
- Thank the employee for his commitment and ability to have this dialogue.
- Follow up. If they changed their behavior, noticing and acknowledging (the work of a moment) will cement the change.
In my experience, I find most people want their bosses to be fair, acknowledge them for a job well done and to deliver constructive criticism straightforwardly and kindly. Focus on your own state of mind and make sure that your intent is to be kind — and remember, it is kind to give people feedback which makes them better at their job and more successful in their career.
*Thanks to my collaborator, Judy Clarke of Team HR, www.team-hr.com
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