In the last two installments of the series on what winning looks like, we explored mindset and setting clear goals and expectations. Today, we will talk about the delicate act of giving feedback.
This concept of understanding what winning looks like can prove to be a valuable way of getting to your desired goal while not getting off track. While difficult as it may be at first, I would encourage you to examine very low-risk interactions and see how you might practice this concept. Define what the win should look like, figure out where or how you might get triggered, work to understand the other person’s perspective, and what a resolution that all parties could agree on and feel good about could look like.
This is not always easy and the more practice you have in lower risk situations the better set up you will be for success in the highest stakes conversations you will need to have, ones where you don’t have a choice but to achieve a win, because to not win, means you lost much more than you were willing to give up. One of these high-stakes conversations that adds a layer of complexity is the struggle between you and your direct reports as well as you and your manager. There are several differences in how managing up and managing down can be done, we won’t get into it here, but rather explore the layered concept of delivering feedback in such a way that is heard as it is intended.
Perspective, the sum total of an individual’s experiences that shape how they see and understand the world around them, weighs heavily on how feedback, especially critical feedback is heard. You could have the perfect messaging that accounts for the situation, the outcome, and the personality of the receiving party, and it can still land poorly. You’ll be left wondering “why did that go so bad? I did everything right, but the outcome looks nothing like what I had expected.” The other party may now resent you, completely disagree with your assessment, have no idea where you were coming from, think you are a jerk, a micromanager, or worse, a boss they would rather not work for.
These are all possible outcomes, because the one thing not accounted for in how you delivered the feedback is the most important part, the perspective of the other person, not you. Feedback is not about you, it is about the other person. I’ll say that again, feedback is not about you, it’s about the person. You can prepare until you are blue in the face, but if you don’t consider the other person’s perspective prior to giving feedback, you might as well flip a coin on the outcome.
This is the second layer of understanding what winning looks like and speaks to the path you might take to arrive at your desired end goal. In thinking about the other person’s perspective, we need to ensure we understand how they best receive feedback, and not just how direct or indirect we are, but have we really considered the fundamental personality of the other person, are they easily demoralized, do they have thick skin, do they prefer direct candor, or an approach that is a little less direct. These preferences should not be ignored just because you have a preferred style of delivering feedback, again, it’s about them and not you.
Getting back to what winning looks like, does winning look like you staying consistent with how you give feedback to everyone on your team, or rather everyone on your team taking away and really understanding the feedback you have given them? I would hope it would be the latter.
One exercise that has proved helpful in ensuring feedback is heard the way it is intended and allows for consideration of all perspectives and personalities is the idea of separating the person from the performance. Many people (not all, but many) when confronted with critical feedback, actually don’t hear feedback on their performance or work, they hear critical feedback about them personally (ie, the end result was not as good as it should have been, is heard as, I am not as good as you thought I was.)
One of these is much easier to hear than the other, and to help ensure my direct reports don’t hear my feedback about their performance as feedback about them as a person, we take three minutes before the conversation starts and I ask them to imagine separating their performance from them as a person, take this imaginary performance and place it on the table, visualize their performance as a third entity or person in the room, show me where it is sitting. After they have done this we start the real conversation about the feedback I need to give them, and along the way I make sure that I am speaking to their performance and not them. In this way, they are almost a 3rd party observing and listening to the conversation.
They no longer leave the meeting feeling like they are not good enough, but rather where and how their performance could be improved and what their performance might want to do differently next time. This exercise in and of itself won’t accomplish what winning looks like, I will still have to be purposeful in what I say to ensure they hear what I am saying, in the same way, I intended it. I will still need to be mindful of what might trigger me, and how being triggered could distract me from my goal. However, getting someone on your team to a place where they can hear honest feedback and not personalize it, will give you a much greater chance of you and your direct report leaving the meeting feeling good about the outcome, something that will only provide a better chance for a more favorable or desired result for their performance in the future.