Taking Feedback – How not to MESS it up.

Dear Readers, 

Taking feedback is also an important skill that we need to know, practice and harness.  If we don’t know how to handle feedback, we may mess up the relationship and our Career too.  In this posting, I want to share my thoughts on how to take or handle feedback. 

1. First Listen:

First listen and listen fully without any filters, disliking and any interruption.  It’s easier said than done.  It is a tough task because we immediately become busy thinking as to how to counter or justify.

Genuine efforts to listen and understand what the other person has got to say will go a long-way in understanding ourselves better (Knowing the Blind spot) and understanding and realising our full potential.

Talking about Listening, it’s a skill to be really practiced and harnessed like any other skill. Many times it’s generally taken for granted thinking that we are really good at it. But the fact is, right from the beginning of our life, we have always been taught how to read, write and speak but very rarely how to listen.

  

Believe me, Listening pays.  Listening is respecting.

2. Accept and don’t become Defensive:

No human is perfect. Taking and accepting feedback that highlights our improvement areas need not have to hurt our ego or self-esteem.  In fact, it will show us in better light as a person who is willing to take accountability for the mistake and learn from it. On the other hand, when we allow it, we tend to be defensive.

It’s a common mistake that many of us do.  It’s easy to accept the mistake than to justify in detail why you could not do it. The more we try to justify, the more we would get exposed. That’s the fact.

  

I would like to quote what Stephen R Covey said. “Making a mistake is one thing and not accepting is another thing.  When we refuse to accept, we refuse to learn from our mistake and own responsibility for the mistake”.

When we become defensive, we become blind to all the important feedback that we need in our professional or life journey and we also stop the other person/s from giving feedback to us freely.

It’s a sure recipe to become stagnant and obsolete.

3. It’s not Personal

It’s commonly said that it’s very difficult to give feedback to Indians because we tend to take it personally.  By and large, I would agree with this.  The first feedback raises some doubts as to whether I am being disliked.  We take the second and third feedback as a confirmation for disliking and it causes friction in the relationship.

It would be good if we can consciously train ourselves to accept that the feedback is about a particular job and it’s not personal. 

Let us not dislike the person, peer / boss, giving the feedback. It should not cause friction in the relationship, reporting or peer relationship.

4. Do Validate:

We may get lot of feedback in our professional /life journey. We don’t have to start acting on every feedback given and it may not be wise too.

But it’s important to evaluate it objectively first and if it’s making sense, we should accept it and work on it.

Acceptance is the first step towards change and self-development.

5. Do Participate:

We can become proactive and participate in the feedback process.   We can ask for situations and circumstances wherein we did not perform to the expected level, mistakes made etc., This will throw lot of light as to where we are lacking and what we need to do.

This will make the whole process healthy and one would come across as someone who is really interested in self-analysis and development. 

6. Check your Emotions

Sometimes, I’ve seen people getting really disturbed and becoming very emotional.  Few get very upset and end up crying too.  This is a strict “Don’t” unless you want to come across as someone who is not matured enough/who cannot handle his/her own emotions.

We should learn to channelize our emotions and express it in a more acceptable manner.

Conclusion:

As I said before, we should learn how to handle feedback. It’s one important skill that every professional should possess.  One should take conscious efforts to learn and acquire it like any other skills.

When we don’t handle feedback well, we may mess up the relationship and our Career too. That is a huge stake.

Remember, every feedback pushes us to give our best and become the best.

diD yOU enJOY ReADinG ThIS ArTIcLE? 

                                  If yES, 

yOU maY sHAre it wiTH Your FriENds tOO.

Feedback – How not to MESS it UP- III

Dear Readers,

In this posting, I’ve written about the importance of "walking the talk" before giving feedback.  Hope you would find it interesting.

Should we walk the talk?

I remember a story of mother who would be very unhappy that her son is eating lot of sugar which is not good for health.  She would take him to a Saint nearby hoping that the saint can give appropriate feedback to her son and her son would also listen to him.  After listening to the mother, the Saint would ask the mother to come after a week.  The next week, when she goes, the saint would advise the boy not to have too much of sugar.

Surprised that the Saint could have done it last week itself, she would ask him why he took one week time and what is the reason for delaying it by a week.

The saint would reveal to her that he himself was indulging in having lot of sugar till last week.  Before advising, he wanted to stop it himself first and then advise the boy.

This story conveys one simple message very effectively. 

Unless one “walks the talk” or is a role model, he cannot give feedback or advice anyone on that particular aspect. 

No walk the talk means it’s just a preaching which will never be effective and others can easily see us through in the long run. As leaders or Managers, we would not have a moral ground to just preaching without practising.

One cannot talk about cost cutting on one side and spend lavishly on personal perks on the other side.

I still remember how one Business leader set himself as a role model in one my of earlier organisation when it was going through a tough phase and when lot of austerity measures were being taken to save the Plant.  Besides various measures, at personal level, the Business Head got his jeep’s (used for daily plant visit) petrol engine replaced with an old diesel engine from the workshop.  And he did that with a very genuine intention.  When employees came to know about it, every message and feedback that he conveyed on cost-cutting had a very good reach till the grass-root level and everyone was looking up to him.

To put it in a nutshell, we can talk about

 Ø Honesty only when we are honest

Ø Integrity and ethics only when we practice it in our day-to-day life

Ø Punctuality only when are punctual

Ø Fairness and objectivity only when we are fair in our transactions, decision-making etc., 

I think this sums up the message as to why one  should be a role model or walk the talk himself first before giving feedback to others.  

That’s all for this posting. Would appreciate your thoughts &  feedback and pls. do share your experience too. 

diD yOU enJOY ReADinG ThIS ArTIcLE? 

                                  If yES, 

yOU maY sHAre it wiTH Your FriENds tOO.

Feedback – How not to MESS it UP – II

Dear Readers,

I have written few more points in continuation of the last post on feedback.

1) Data-based approach:

Data puts things in the right perspective in a precise manner without any ambiguity for both the parties involved in the feedback process. It avoids conflicts and it’s easy to convince. 

Wherever possible, one should always try to quantify and speak with data. 

For instance, instead of saying, performance needs to be improved (for a production staff) it can be quantified and said like “Productivity is less by 30%” or “Quality is less by 10%”.

2) Hot-stove Rule – McGregor

The hot-stove rule of McGregor in discipline management can be applied in feedback process too. In fact, feedback is part of disciplinary management.

When you touch the hot stove, you get your fingers burnt. It’s immediate, consistent, impersonal and you are already aware that if you touch it, it will burn your finger.

Similarly, for feedback to have maximum impact and to bring out the desired change, it should be given immediately then and there.  It has to be consistent, impersonal (fair and objective) and there should be clarity on what is the expected norm /what would be construed as a deviation from the norm.

3) Liking and disliking:

Sometimes, I’ve seen supervisors/managers hesitating to give feedback fearing that their team members would start disliking them.

Peter Drucker said “Leadership is not about liking or disliking. It’s about delivering results”. 

As long as one is fair and transparent in his approach, there should not be any hesitation.  Going by liking and disliking and avoiding feedback in the right time will lead to complacency and ineffective teams.  And it’s a not an effective supervisory / leadership style.

4) Keep emotions in check

We humans are emotional beings.  It’s very important not to bring in emotions at the time of giving feedback. 

For instance, when you overreact, the very purpose of feedback would be defeated.  Sometimes, one tends to take a soft stand and hesitate to share feedback which should also be avoided.

Aristotle said, “before getting angry, one should ask whether he is angry for the right reason, with the right person, at the right time and to the right degree. 

I think it’s worthwhile to remember this golden principle. One should ask similar questions in his mind and decide as to how to share the feedback in the most appropriate way.

Over dosage of feedback with emotions will lead to only de-motivation.

What do you think about Feedback as an effective tool for People Development?  Would appreciate your “Feedback” and thoughts.

diD yOU enJOY ReADinG ThIS ArTIcLE? 

                                  If yES, 

yOU maY sHAre it wiTH Your FriENds tOO.