I have the honor and privilege of being a Culture Champion at work, a role I have cherished for over 1.5 years now. Basically, I exude the company’s culture and have the honor of ensuring my team of 50+ practice our core values on a day-to-day basis. I’m a glorified cheerleader, proudly dancing to our team song on the reg. One topic recently discussed was Feedback. It was a great forum, lessons learned and applicable examples. See below for some workplace tips.
Recently I have come to the conclusion that when it comes to feedback, I am like a bi-polar chick off her meds. I can take it (and dish it) from my hubs, family and closest friends. But when receiving feedback at work I tend to take it so personally! Honestly, I think I have a deep rooted fear; of what, I’m not sure. I know J, my mom/sister and friends aren’t going anywhere. I know that when they give me feedback, they mean it from their heart, are challenging me to be a better person and do so with empathy and grace. I don’t know why I can’t take the same approach at work, sometimes ending in tears. #blameitonpregnancyhormones #lastbathroomstallwithmynameonit. I know they are challenging me and want the best for me too. Can someone tell me psychologically what might be going on here?
Here are some tips on how to give and receive feedback. The benefit of creating a feedback environment is to create a sense of honesty, to be heard & to listen, transparency and clarity with where you stand. Focus on the results vs. the style of how it is getting done.
Delivering Corrective Feedback (or as some folks say “constructive”):
- Set your intention
- Prepare - practice with someone
- In feedback situation:
- Ask for the other person’s perception of the situation
- If the person describes the feedback you were going to give, great! Convo’s over! No need to rehash.
- What was the observable behavior?
- Where & when did it take place?
- Why is this important to you and what was the potential impact?
- Again, ask them for their perspective to this, participate in your feedback.
- Listen to learn
- Next steps & follow up
- Ask for the other person’s perception of the situation
Delivering Encouraging Feedback (or “positive”)
Same steps as above :) It’s really key that when delivering any feedback, give one Corrective with three Encouraging. By doing so, you create an environment where there is a sense of security, shows appreciation, helps to offset difficult feedback in the future and most importantly you build emotional capital in the relationship.
Key Points:
- Be concrete - give specific examples rather than generalizations. The key here is to not get the other side to feel attacked and auto-pilot on the defensive side. You know it won’t be a productive conversation.
Do it in less than 1 minute
Make eye contact & read the nonverbal communication coming back at you
I am actually excited to put this to practice and use it in a few upcoming hard discussions I know I have to have, both at work and personally. Any feedback experiences you want to share? Anything NOT go as planned and how did you deal?