The Quick Guide to Giving Feedback

There may come a time in your life when you have to provide feedback or criticism to someone.  It won’t always be positive feedback you need to address, either.  This can make things stressful, embarrassing, or even something you try to avoid.  With the information provided below, you can feel confident that you are handling it in an efficient and professional manner.

What I am about to discuss is nothing new, heck is anything I write?  I am not providing reference material, I didn’t study this for days on end in college, and I am not just stealing someone’s work.  This is what I have found works best after doing it for 15 years.  Some of the concepts were learned through articles, emails, or seminars and some were learned just through trial and error.  It’s not my intention to not give credit; it’s just that it’s all been so blended, reshaped, and rephrased by others so many times there isn’t a distinct source.  Again, these are the things that have worked for me personally – your mileage may vary.

Once again, I am writing from a service perspective and an employer/employee relationship.  This information is still applicable in other settings such as a coach and their client, or a co-worker (or friend) you are working on a project with.

So on that note, let’s get to it.

Feedback is more than just what you did wrong.

When a lot of people hear “feedback” they either think of a high pitch peal through the microphone, or that they are going to hear about something they did wrong.  It becomes a dreadful experience, people would rather skip to the end, and a rare few get anything from it.  That is, if you follow the general trend with giving feedback.  What I just described makes it sound pretty useless, doesn’t it?  Truth be told, if done incorrectly it’s worse than useless, it’s damaging.

Here’s what a typical feedback session with an employee looks like (I have been on the receiving end many times, and I also admit to giving feedback like this in my early days as a supervisor):

“Hi Bob, got a minute?  Let’s go to my office.  I brought you in here because I need to talk to you about your attendance.  You’ve been late 3 times since last week and if you do it again I am going to have to write you up.  OK?”

And that’s the end of it.  A meager nod from Bob as he stands up to leave and your job is done.  Ask yourself this question: what value did that interaction have?  The manager didn’t ask to find out why Bob was late, didn’t let Bob speak, really, and no suggestions were given.  There was also no praise or understanding given, so Bob now (we’ll give him the benefit of the doubt) feels worse about it.

When providing feedback, it goes a long way when you incorporate these fundamentals: the purpose of the conversation, the importance of the action or policy, how they did not adhere, and suggestions for improvement.

Our example becomes:
“Hi Bob, got a minute?  Let’s go to my office.  I brought you in here because I need to talk to you about your recent attendance.  You’re an asset to this company and we need to be able to rely on you to show up on time, so that we can meet the needs of our customers.  And as you know, we have an attendance policy for that reason.  I’ve noticed you’ve been late 3 times since last week, is there a reason for this you can tell me about?  The bottom line is that we need you here on time and if you are late again, I’ll need to write you up and I don’t want to do that.  What are your thoughts on preventing this in the future?”

Obviously you can tailor it to your personality.  In some situations, it’s not as black and white such as with a policy violation.  These fundamentals will go a long way (and it’s great for HR paperwork if you need to file any since you are reiterating the policy or expectation).

The thing of it is, no one likes to just be called out.  They want to know you aren’t just arbitrarily saying they did something, without any evidence or reason.  By explaining why you wanted to speak to them, giving them the reason behind the policy or expectation, examples of what they did, and suggestions for improvement you establish rapport and buy-in.  It also shows that you know what you’re talking about and the chance of the employee contesting it drops significantly.

A note on delivery.

I think one of the most overlooked pieces of giving feedback is how you phrase things.  What you say is important, but how you say things is important as well.  I’m not going to get into the qualities of voice or matching sensory language, fear not, but I will leave you with this; keep your voice as neutral and free of judgment as possible.

That said, is there a method to giving feedback? Why yes, yes there is.  Some circles call it the sandwich approach, some call it positive-negative-positive, and some call it the cookie concept.  Whatever you decide to call it, it’s pretty much the same thing.  I noticed after I started following this method my feedback sessions became way more effective and a lot more enjoyable for everyone involved.

In short, the basic formula is this:

• Start with a positive.
  “Bob, you’re great with the customers and your sales numbers are some of our highest.”
• Move to the negative or the issue needing to be resolved.
  “I’ve noticed at times that you use slang and are too casual with the customer at times.  While we want to be friendly with the customer, we don’t want to sound unprofessional.  For example, say ‘yes’ instead of ‘uh huh’.”
• Finish with a positive.
  “You really take the time to listen to the customer and suggest an appropriate product.”

That is only the structure of the delivery.  As we already talked about, a coaching session is more than just bullet points.  At the end of your feedback session, it’s good to recap action items and to cover the next steps.

Let’s look at a scenario and I will give you a full example of a feedback session.  Sound good?

Situation: Tom has been training in your facility for 2 weeks now.  The clients seem to love him and he’s brought in some referrals.  However, he can be lazy with his paperwork and sometimes waits until after his session to have the client fill out their initial intake form.  You scheduled a meeting with Tom in your office and he’s just sat down.

“Hi Tom, thanks for being on time.  [purpose of the conversation] As we spoke about in your orientation, one of the goals of Gregogym is to provide the best possible experience for the customer while teaching them safe and effective ways to exercise.  Part of that process is to have regular sit-downs with management to discuss your performance and to answer any questions you may have.  I wanted to give you some feedback and also discuss your paperwork.

(Start positive) You have a great knack for this which is why we hired you.  The customers love you and it’s evident that you really enjoy what you do.

(Negative) I’ve noticed though, that on occasion you have [issue/violation] waited until after your session to get the intake form completed. [why it’s important]Client intake forms are something that the insurance company requires us to have for every client, but more than that – they allow us to better customize our approach for them.  [reiterate policy]We need to have them filled out and signed prior to working with any client, as stated in the employee handbook.   [suggestion for improvement] Perhaps going forward it might help if you have them fill out the form while you get them some water or set up for the session.

(Positive) Plus, once you get that paperwork out of the way, it will allow you to do what you do best – provide excellent training to the client.

What do you think?

Excellent.  To recap – the clients love you.  From now on,[action item] you’ll get all of your intake forms completed prior to your session, and we’ll keep growing your client base. [next steps] I’ll reach out in another 2 weeks or so to check in with you.  Thank you for your time, I’ll let you get back to training.”

Each situation will vary and what is actually said will differ as well.  This was just one example to give you an idea.

Let me know what you think in the comments below.

/grego