How to give feedback that catalyzes growth
Being a Manager is one of those experiences that forces you to grow not only as a professional but as an individual. Personally, I believe that one’s management style is an extension of who they are as a person. Not always, but more often than not.
One of the facets of management that I’ve been reading a lot about is giving feedback.
I remember the first time I had to give a colleague constructive feedback.
‘Where do I even begin?’
‘How will they take it?’
‘Will they still like me?’
These are the thoughts that ran through my mind. It was very early on in my career and my solution at that time was to do the job for them.
‘Why have conflict when I could avoid it altogether?’
This is an approach I had often taken in my personal life that was now seeping into my professional life. But this approach can only serve you for so long. Your colleague goes on thinking that they’re doing a stellar job while you walk around overworked and resentful because you’re doing the job of two people.
If this instance happens with your direct report imagine their shock when you give them a negative performance review when all along they’ve either received insincere feedback or no feedback at all. Their first thought during that review will most probably be:
‘ Why didn’t you tell me!’
To put this in perspective, let’s think about the instances below. You:
- Barely put in any effort to study and passed the exam.
- Shared mediocre work with your manager and received praise.
- Missed a few workouts/training sessions and won the competition.
If you barely put in any work and still receive positive results then that becomes your baseline. You will barely study and expect to succeed, you will not give 100% at work cause 50% seems to be enough and you will continue to miss training sessions because you will still win competitions. Nothing will push you to do and be better even when you know you can. Your growth will be limited.
If NO ONE tells you that you’re not doing a great job, how will you know what to improve on?
Now picture the below. You:
- Barely put in any effort to study and failed the exam.
- Shared mediocre work with your manager and received criticism.
- Missed a few workouts/training sessions and lost the competition.
If the above happened, how would you feel this time around?
Personally, I would take a minute to reflect, internalize the ‘failure’ and work 10 times harder to get the results I want. I will study harder, research my work, give it my all and be more disciplined with my training.
That is the power of constructive feedback: IT SPARKS GROWTH. It acts as a compass showing you where you need to put in more work to get to where you want to be.
But just because we now understand the power of constructive feedback, doesn’t make it any easier to give.
How can I give someone direct feedback while still taking into account their feelings?
How do I challenge someone directly while still showing that I care for them?
For most of us, we are familiar with the feedback methodology known as: The Sandwich Method.
This method serves its purpose, however it does have a few limitations. It could feel forced, the message might get lost in all the fluff, the receiver of the message will always be waiting for the ‘but’ etc. Yes, it can work in certain situations but in some IT IS JUST NOT EFFECTIVE.
In walks in the concept of Radical Candor.
Mid last year, I stumbled upon a book called Radical Candor by Kim Scott. (I highly recommend this book for anyone in management.) It touches in detail the importance of giving feedback and how to hold performance development conversations.
In the book, they talk about two key principles to keep in mind when giving feedback:
- How do I care personally? and
- How do I challenge directly?
This sweet spot is what is referred to as radical candor. It is a type of communication that is open, sincere and direct.
If you err on the side of not caring personally you’ll end up either being very aggressive in how you give your feedback or being ‘meh’ and not giving any feedback at all because you don’t care about the person’s growth. This is known as Obnoxious Aggression and Manipulative Insincerity respectively.
If you do care personally, you’ll end up either erring on the side of not challenging directly, which is known as Ruinous Empathy (you don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings) or finding that sweet spot we now know as Radical Candor: Caring Personally & Challenging Directly.
Ironically, people who are Obnoxiously Aggressive tend to get ahead more than those in the Ruinous Empathy and Manipulative Insincerity quadrants because at the very least they do give feedback. You know where you always stand with them. Coincidentally, thanks to this expose from TechCabal we all got to see what the extremes of obnoxious aggression can look like if allowed to roam free.
You can read more about the 4 quadrants (with some examples) in this great summary of the book.
Mastering giving feedback is a process, sometimes you get it right and sometimes you don’t. Early this year, I gave someone constructive feedback but in the wrong environment. Yes, it was necessary feedback that they appreciated, but the environment wasn’t right. Luckily I got the opportunity to apologize to them and learn from that situation.
Learning something new always takes time and continuous practice. And again it’s only through failing and receiving feedback do we continuously grow and improve.
To help you stay on track when giving feedback, always remember that Radical Candor is HIP.
So the next time you’re toying around with the idea of giving someone constructive feedback, the answer is always YES.
Feedback is a gift, as cliche as that sounds, so don’t hold back on helping those around you succeed.
All the best on your journey! And remember to follow the HIP checklist next time you’re tasked with giving feedback.
#ChooseToThrive
Update: Curious about the art of receiving feedback? Check out my follow-up article on why it can be so hard to receive difficult feedback on this link.
