Truth or Consequences: The way to Give Employee Feedback

In the bestseller, Good to Great, Jim Collins discovered that, ” the nice-to-great companies continually refined the path to greatness with the brutal facts of reality.”

And, in his recent autobiography, Jack Welch reports that he spent about half of his time on people: recruiting new talent, choosing the right people for particular positions, grooming young stars, developing managers, going through under performers, and reviewing the complete talent pool.

Says Welch, ” Having one of the most talented people in each of our businesses is an important thing. If we don’t, we lose.”

Why is it that many people dispose of giving feedback to our employees while we intuitively know that giving and getting honest feedback is key to grow and develop and to build successful organizations? Maybe it’s because there are such a large amount of the way to screw it up.

Here are ten common feedback mistakes:

1. Speaking out only when things are wrong. ” Praise to a person represents what sunlight, water and soil are to a plant – the climate by which one grows best.” – Earl Nightingale

2. ” Drive-by” praise without specifics or a good underpinning. – ” Great job!”

3. Waiting until performance or behavior is substantially below expectations before acting on it.

4. Giving positive or negative feedback long after the event has occurred.

5. Not taking responsibility to your thoughts, feelings and reactions. ” This comes straight from the boss.”

6. Giving feedback through e-mail messages, notes, or over the telephone.

7. Giving negative feedback in public.

8. Criticizing performance without giving suggestions for improvement.

9. No follow up afterwards.

10. Not having regularly scheduled performance review meetings.

Giving and receiving clear and constructive feedback requires courage and talent, and is crucial to building good relationships with and motivating peak performance from your team.

Here are four tips for the way to do right:

1. Be proactive. Nip issues inside the bud and avoid the messy interpersonal tangles that result from neglected communication. Meeting with employees on a monthly or quarterly basis rather than annually, for instance, conveys, ” Your success is necessary to me, so I would like to be accessible to you.”

2. Be specific. It’s never easy to offer negative feedback regarding someone’s work, but as a frontrunner you can’t avoid it. Be as clear as possible when providing feedback (both positive and negative). Give specific examples that illustrate your points.

For example: In place of saying, ” Your attitude is bad” or ” That didn’t work,” you could possibly say something like, ” Once you miss deadlines, then cross your arms and look away after I discuss it with you, it gives me the impression that you just don’t care concerning the quality of your work. I’d wish to believe this isn’t true. Can you help me explain this better?”

3. Develop a progress plan. Be clear concerning the specific changes in behavior that you just expect in a particular time period, and follow up as scheduled.

4. Link employees’ performance to organizational goals. Reinforce the cost of your employees’ contributions by giving specific examples of the way their work and positive behaviors serve the organization and its customers.

If you might be not doing this stuff, why would anyone else on your organization do them? Craft a performance appraisal process that encourages truth or consequences.