The 2 Most Important Sentences In A Feedback Conversation.
To get a feedback conversation right,
prepare two simple statements.
Then, open a conversation.
It’s common to over-engineer a feedback conversation, out of a sincere want for the other person to have a good experience.
That’s why it’s useful to remember that our feedback conversation only needs two sentences.
These are:
Your observation.
The impact of that observation.
Then … you hand the other person the mic. What’s their take?
Let’s look at some examples.
Here are three real life examples. As you can see, it can be short, or introspective.
“I’ve noticed you don’t quite seem like yourself. Is everything cool?”
“I noticed you seem hesitant to delegate. It’s on my mind as from my perspective, if you get sick, or go on holiday, it puts the project at risk. Is that something you’re conscious of or think about?”
“‘I was thinking, looking back on the project - as you know, there were deadlines that got stretched out. From my perspective, I know we can do better, but I don’t know how the process could be better for you in future. What do you think?”
Why is not talking after the first bit so important?
When someone gives you feedback, your amygdala, the part of your brain responsible for project managing your stress responses, is on alert.
Anticipating you are in danger, it sends signals to protect yourself.
This looks like: defensiveness, argumentativeness, frustration, walking out, zoning out, or justifying actions or behaviour.
You can’t think critically when in this mode.
Or engage in thoughtful reflection, especially about your performance. All you can do is protect yourself.
The quickest way to de-escalate defensiveness is to hand that person the mic.
What they say might be defensive-jibber-jabber for a bit, but not dissimilar to deflating a balloon, what happens as a result is that you can have a two-way conversation where you’re both listening.
If you don’t get a chance to say how you see things, it’s not a feedback conversation.
It’s a lecture.
When people are involved in the problem-solving process they are more empowered.
When they aren’t, they nod politely, hoping it’ll be over soon.
It’s their career - let them tell you what they see and how they see it.
What could your ‘stop and listen’ cue look like?
Here are examples:
“What’s your take on this?”
“You and I both know I have no idea how to make the workflow better. What would you suggest?”
“I don’t have an answer, but can we agree, it’s something to think about?”
It’s involving the person in the problem-solving process.
Handing the mic is avoiding a dump and run.
A dump and run is where you share your feedback, get it off your ‘chest’ and leave the room, feeling your job is done.
In reality, your KPI is that both parties are clear on what to do next.
A feedback dump and run can cause real damage to the relationship.
Why? It signals, when you talk and don’t listen, that just one person is important in the relationship.
In a healthy, respectful relationship, both parties are important.
‘Do as I say’ vs ‘what could you do’.
It can be frustrating indulging the idea of asking someone how they see something. Especially when you feel their behaviour or performance is outrageous.
When you tell someone what to do, you aren’t telling them how to think. You are training them to rely on you.
If you want less single person reliance, and people able to make decisions when you’re not in the room, it’s your job to teach them how to think.
The way to do that is to make it their job to solve the problem, which you simply bring to their attention through illumination (your observation, the first sentence).
“But what if they don’t do it?”
If they don’t want to, that’s cool. That’s their choice.
That’s another conversation if they choose not to act. And/or, feedback for you on whether the environment feels good enough for them to ask for help.
But the flip side is this.
Ironically, it’s much less work for you.
It removes you from needing to save the day. It empowers them to take positive action.
If you can be cool with how someone does something, but aligned on the ‘what’ or ‘why’, the details really don’t matter.
As long as there’s positive change, right?
When you involve people in the problem-solving process, you empower them.
When you talk at them, you do the opposite.
Here’s the framework we teach in our workshops:
Observation.
Impact.
Hand the mic.
End on an agreement. (The agreement can be agreeing to reflect and discuss later).
Knowing how to start a conversation is the first step.
The second is knowing when to stop talking.
Research tells us that employees perform 3.6x better when they get regular feedback, yet nearly half of leaders avoid giving feedback.
This simple framework (observation, then impact, then: stop talking), changes those statistics in your workplace.
The impact?
Empowered team members, having frequent, useful, specific, feedback conversations.
In our Giving & Receiving Feedback Programme, we teach these lessons.
We cover how to open a feedback conversation, manage defensiveness, and land on an agreement.
The result is that people have more productive feedback conversations.
What could your leaders and individual contributors achieve at work if they got regular, empowering feedback?
Giving & Receiving Feedback Programme.
For leaders and individual contributors.