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10 Tips To Use Feedback Positively In Your Management

Guest post by: Martin Haworth

Article Overview: Feedback is a very useful tool that can make or break an employee. In the wrong hands; used wrongly, feedback can easily be negative and damaging. The best managers know a different way...

10 Tips To Use Feedback Positively In Your Management

The trouble here is inconsistency. Ever been asked "Would you like some feedback?"...and felt a sense of trepidation; a sense of being uncomfortable because criticism was just round the corner? It need not be like that and you, as manager, can make it different. Creating a positive activity that is valued by everyone, especially those on the receiving end.

You see, some people see that something which has gone wrong makes them failures, which can be very damaging. Others look for what they can do differently next time, to create value in the experience.

And this is where you can help.

By building confidence in a safe environment, you can provide supportive, constructive and still challenging feedback as the very best gift you can give to your people.

Feedback is a fabulous tool which, when used well, can significantly leverage the abilities, both already demonstrated and still latent in your people.

This is a skill that can be developed and become such a positive asset to have in your toolkit.

Those managers who really are the best at providing feedback...

1. Consistently Give It

They make sure that giving and receiving feedback is regular and consistent throughout their team. This creates an expectation that it will happen - and it does.

2. Accept It

They model it themselves and ask for it as well. So, by accepting feedback themselves they lead by example, encouraging others to become involved.

3. See it as a Gift

Rather than a chore or 'difficult', they see feeding back as a positive act, benefiting the recipient, the business and themselves.

4. Avoid Criticism

Feeding back takes a shape as follows:-

• "What was good about what happened?"
• "What might you want to do differently next time?"

Both asked of the recipient first.

Then the giver offers his or her view on the same two questions. In that order, it gives time for the recipient to recognize the performance themselves, which is much stronger than just 'being told'.

5. Be Focused on What's Next

By regarding the differences for the 'next time' people great at feeding back line up their people with a new opportunity, building confidence and registering the changes in the moment.

6. Use Constructive Words

Rarely will those skilled at giving feedback use negatives in their language. They find ways of saying things which concentrate on positives and still get the message across.

7. Give Quickly

Where you can, deliver feedback immediately. Those who give feedback most effectively, never leave it any longer than necessary.

8. Use Focused Questioning

When you use feedback well, the questions you are there to find out more. They help you - and the person you are giving feedback to - explore possibilities and opportunities.

9. Enable Others

Because there is a such a strong and supportive culture, the process begins an upward spiral of performance in the team. Indeed, in full swing, self-feedback becomes the norm!

10. Provide Support

Once they have a process for feeding back naturally established, there is a new way forward. They are able to create interlinked supportive structures for all of their team members - including themselves.

When feedback becomes the natural way you and your people work together, it will be seen as a welcoming act of support and desire to help, rather than a tactic that is used to bully and create fear.

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Article Tags: deliver feedback immediately, feedback positvely, give feedback, giving feedback, management development



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