Right Attitudes » Ideas for Impact
» by Nagesh Belludi

A common mistake we make in giving feedback to others is that we tend to defer corrective (negative) feedback. We put off criticism until the problem escalates or, as managers, wait until the employee’s performance review discussions. This predisposition is often rooted in the fear that negative feedback will offend the other and thus affect our rapport with the other.

Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz offers a ‘puppy theory’ on timing feedback:

I have the puppy theory. When the puppy pees on the carpet, you say something right then because you don’t say six months later, “Remember that day, January 12th, when you peed on the carpet?” That doesn’t make any sense. “This is what’s on my mind. This is quick feedback.”

Immediate Feedback is Most Useful

I have previously discussed that effective feedback has three aspects: (1) initiate a personal conversation and make sure the other is ready to hear it, (2) explain his behavior, and, (3) help him understand the consequences of his behavior.

Do not neglect or defer feedback. Address problems while they are small. Immediate feedback ensures that the other accepts your feedback, understands his behavior and attempts to correct.

Recommended Reading

• Sandwich feedback technique and why it is ineffective
• Manager Tools’ feedback model
• Six steps to appreciate people
• Any excuses for not complimenting your people

***See other articles related to giving feedback, criticism, manager skills, interpersonal skills, praise

A skilled manager understands how to get work done through her staff under all circumstances. She makes herself available, delegates effectively and provides appropriate feedback. She works hard to sustain an effective work environment in which her staff feels motivated and takes pleasure in their achievements.

The skilled manager is talented at discerning what her employees think and feel about their work, and assessing their level of happiness on the job. She recognizes unhappy employees through these four noticeable changes in behaviors over time.

• Tardiness: The unhappy employee tends to arrive late, leave early and takes longer breaks. He is often elusive and hard to pin down.
• Disdain: The unhappy employee can be grouchy, whining, or exceedingly complaining. He tends to be oversensitive: he sulks at even the slightest criticism, gets defensive, or accuses supervisors of picking on him.
• Indifference: The unhappy employee cannot focus on his responsibilities. Consequently, his work tends to be disorganized and incomprehensive. His workload is a struggle. He fails to update management on a regular basis, rarely has a say in important matters, and resists new assignments.
• Aloofness: The unhappy employee is inclined to distance himself physically, socially and emotionally from his coworkers. He is likely to be uncooperative and refuses to accommodate others’ requests.

Recommended Articles on Managing

• Four questions for employee performance appraisals
• Delegate Outcomes, Not Just Tasks
• Distinguish Accountability from Responsibility
• Excuses for not praising people

***See other articles related to Motivation, recognition, managing people, work environment, leading

Those who gave thee a body,
furnished it with weakness;
but He who gave thee Soul,
armed thee with resolution.
Employ it, and thou art wise;
be wise and thou art happy.
* Akhenaton

You do anything long enough to escape the habit of
living until the escape becomes the habit.
* David Ryan

When there is no moon, you go by the stars.
* Somali Proverb

To speak kindly does not hurt the tongue.
* Proverb

We might remind ourselves that criticism is as inevitable as breathing,
and that we should be none the worse for articulating what passes in our minds
when we read a book and feel an emotion about it,
for criticizing our own minds in their work of criticism.
* T.S. Eliot

Stand up, be bold, be strong.
Take the whole responsibility on your own shoulders,
and know that you are the creator of your own destiny.
All the strength and succor you want is within yourselves.
Therefore, make your own future.
* Swami Vivekananda

So long as millions live in hunger and ignorance,
I hold every person a traitor who, having been
educated at their expense, pays not the least heed to them.
* Swami Vivekananda

Everyone is a genius at least once a year;
a real genius has his original ideas closer together.
* Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

When in prayer you clasp your hands, God opens His.
* German proverb

Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it
* Henry David Thoreau

Visit www.Inspiration.RightAttitudes.com for my compilation of inspirational quotations by author and topic. You may also subscribe to the weekly newsletter of inspirational quotations by sending a blank email to iqml-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

*Keyword(s): Inspiration, Quotations

Among the hundred blog posts I wrote in year 2008, here are the ones that received the most visitors, largely by means of Google Search and referrals.

1. The ‘STAR’ technique to answer behavioral interview questions. The best way to impress an interviewer is to discuss your credentials and accomplishments in terms of personal success stories using the ‘STAR’ technique. By following this simple technique, you can narrate direct, meaningful, personalized experiences that best identify your qualifications.
2. Jack Welch’s four types of managers. Organizations face the challenge of developing and sustaining a culture that is both values-centered and performance-driven. Nothing hurts morale more than when leaders tolerate employees who deliver results, but exhibit behaviors that are incongruent to values of the company.
3. Why the sandwich feedback technique is ineffective. The sandwich feedback method consists of praise followed by corrective feedback followed by more praise. However, the sandwich technique amounts to undercutting praise with criticism. A praise followed by criticism undermines the positive impact of praise and weakens the significance of the corrective feedback.
4. Time management: Log where time actually goes. Before you begin managing your time effectively, you need to develop an idea of how you spend time currently. Track how you use your hours and minutes during a suitably long period of time, ideally a whole week. The immediate benefit of time logging is that it induces a sense of significance of your time.
5. Keeping good eye contact. Our eyes play a major role in our interpersonal communication. The eyes express our moods and reactions more overtly than does other body language. People who keep good eye contact are usually seen as personable, self-assured and confident.

6. Overcoming procrastination: The ‘10-Minute Dash’ technique to get a task going. One of the easiest techniques to overcoming procrastination is to begin. Quite often, seemingly difficult tasks get easier once we get working on them. In short time, we get into the ‘flow’ and work towards completion.
7. Effective delegation: Delegate outcomes, not just tasks. The key to effective delegation is to approach delegation as an offer to present to a team member, not a demand to be made. Delegating outcomes–not just tasks–helps managers skillfully present assignments to their team members and empowers them to get the job done.
8. Don’t let ‘perfect’ be the enemy of ‘done’. We need to accept the prospect of compromises to our goals and aspirations. We need to acknowledge that our expectations are often excessive and uncalled for. When we develop a ‘good enough’ or ‘perfect enough’ mindset, we realize that imperfection is, after all, a negotiable outcome.
9. Never surprise your boss. Success in building a relationship with your boss begins with recognizing that this relationship hinges on open communication, cooperation, and credibility. Bosses dislike surprises–positive or negative. Keep your boss in line and suit her preferred style of communication.
10. Make your weekends feel longer. The key to making your weekend feel longer and having a relaxing time is to reorganize your plans and freeing-up time for your favorite, pleasurable activities during the weekend. By prioritizing, improvising and staying on top of things you can arrive at the end of your weekend contented and full of energy for the fresh week ahead.

Thank you very much for your continued readership and support of my work. I wish you and yours a happy, healthy and prosperous year ahead in 2009.

Love is life. And if you miss love, you miss life.
* Leo Buscaglia

A cheerful thought in you produces cheerful thoughts in others.
You are filled with joy and intense delight when you see a batch of
hilarious children playing mirthfully and dancing in joy.
* Swami Shivananda

Hard work performed in a disciplined manner will in most cases keep
the worker fit and also prolong his life.
* Mokshagundam Vishveshwariah

If you wish to avoid criticism,
do nothing, say nothing, be nothing.
* Indira Gandhi

We reap what we sow. We are the makers of our own fate. None else has
the blame, none has the praise.
* Swami Vivekananda

Be prepared to take some shit in life;
just do not take more than a mouthful at a time.
* Forrest Gump

Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do
something you want done because he wants to do it.
* Dwight D. Eisenhower

A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step.
* Chinese Proverb

‘If something’s free, I’ll take two,’ a mentor of mine once said.
His point was that people don’t value things they don’t pay for.
* Edwin J. Feulner

A great mentor is one who aims for others’ abilities to surpass his own.
* Unknown

Visit www.Inspiration.RightAttitudes.com for my compilation of inspirational quotations by author and topic. You may also subscribe to the weekly newsletter of inspirational quotations by sending a blank email to iqml-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

*Keyword(s): Inspiration, Quotations

It was much later that I realized Dad’s secret.
He gained respect by giving it. He talked and listened
to the fourth-grade kids in Spring Valley who shined shoes
the same way he talked and listened to a bishop or a
college president. He was seriously interested
in who you were and what you had to say.
* Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot

Leaders establish the vision for the future and set the strategy for
getting there; they cause change. They motivate and inspire others
to go in the right direction and they, along with everyone else,
sacrifice to get there.
* John Kotter

Before you can inspire with emotion,
you must be swamped with it yourself.
Before you can move their tears, your own must flow.
To convince them, you must yourself believe.
* Winston Churchill

The best of a book is not the thought which it contains,
but the thought which it suggests.
* Oliver Wendell Holmes

Meditation consists in conducting consciousness beyond the point
where it is the consciousness of a finite body or a finite mind,
transferring the focus from level to level without losing its continuity or form.
* Pir Vilayat Khan

Men must be taught as if you taught them not,
And things unknown proposed as things forgot.
* Alexander Pope

To be yourself is an achievement in itself.
* Anonymous

Difficulties are meant to rouse not discourage.
The human spirit is grown strong from conflict.
* Willam Ellery Channing

The tragedy of life is not that man loses,
but that he almost wins.
* Heywood Broun

Concern over criticism clogs creativity.
* Duane Alan Hahn

Visit www.Inspiration.RightAttitudes.com for my compilation of inspirational quotations by author and topic. You may also subscribe to the weekly newsletter of inspirational quotations by sending a blank email to iqml-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

*Keyword(s): Inspiration, Quotations

Feedback is a critical component of our work. We need to understand whether our performance is in line with what is expected of us. We need to learn what we are doing well, what we need to change and how we could improve. We need help to discover opportunities to advance our careers.

One of the common grievances of professionals is that their managers rarely give them adequate feedback. Such feelings are not totally unfounded. Managers tend to be busy and choose to deliver feedback only during cursory performance reviews. And, instinctively, managers fear confrontation: they assume that their employees may respond to even the slightest of criticisms with anger, defensiveness and alienation. Employees, for their part, resent feedback because they hate being criticized.

This article suggests what you can do to become effective at getting feedback from your manager. I have shared this process with several professionals who have successfully adopted it to develop effective relationships with their managers.

Soliciting Feedback

• Setup regular meetings with your manager to seek feedback. Do not wait for the quarterly or annual performance reviews to solicit feedback.
• Prepare and send an agenda to your manager at least one day prior to your meeting. Use the questions in the following section to guide your discussions and agenda. Tailor the questions to suit your unique projects and goals. Cover all the important topics on a regular basis.
• Assure your manager that her opinions and suggestions matter and that you will listen and act on them. You need not necessarily agree to every assessment. Be open; do not become defensive or get angry. If you must disagree, do so politely. Offer your opinions using phrases such as “Could it be because …,” “how about …,” or “perhaps, another way to look at this is ….”
• Ask for specific examples. Take down notes. Conclude the meeting by thanking your manager. Affirm that you will develop and share with her a plan of action.
• Review your notes from the meeting. Look for patterns in her comments and suggestions. In a day or two, develop and send her a plan of action.

Ten Topics to Solicit Feedback On

1. “How am I doing on project or goal X? What can I do differently to be more effective?
2. “My most important projects or goals are X, Y and Z. Do you think I have the priorities right?
3. “Do I meet your expectations in keeping you updated on the progress on project X? How can I organise information better to help you understand my projects and our achievements?
4. “What goals do you see for me on project X (or over the next N months?) How will you measure me against these goals?
5. “What strengths do I bring into your team? What personal skills will enable me to grow and contribute better?
6. “How do you see my career developing in this organisation or function over the long-term? What suggestions do you have for me to prepare for such opportunities?
7. “What steps do you suggest for me to broaden my exposure to our functional area and build my skills? What specific steps can I take to broaden my perspective in our functional area? What key challenges will I face meeting my goals?
8. “What can I do to expand my role? May I assume any additional responsibilities?
9. “What are your goals for the immediate future? What are the most important projects and initiatives for your team? What opportunities do you see for me to support your goals?
10. “How do you think our organization and customers will change in the future? What opportunities do you see? What challenges will we face? How will our roles change? How can we prepare? What is our management’s perspective on the future?”

Concluding Thoughts

This article suggests an informal and effective process to solicit feedback from your manager. By taking the initiative, asking the right questions and proactively soliciting feedback, you can recognize and adapt to your manager’s and the organisation’s expectations of you and discover prospects for larger responsibilities and promotions.

Your manager will appreciate your eagerness to openly communicate, improve, adapt, and contribute further. She will be more forthcoming to share her assessment of your work and offer suggestions for improvement.

By understanding your manager’s expectations and priorities, you can secure the support and resources you need to achieve your goals. Keeping your manager informed helps foster dependability and build a stronger, mutually-beneficial working relationship that benefits you, your manager and the organization.

Recommended Articles

• Never surprise your boss
• Four keys to an excellent relationship with your boss

***See other articles related to Feedback, appreciation, managing your boss, managing vertically, managing relationships, building credibility, performance evaluation, performance review

Introduction

Behavioral interviewing is a popular approach to assess the past experiences of a candidate to judge his/her response to identical situations on a future job. Essentially, behavioral interviewing is based on the premise that “past performance in comparable circumstances is the best predictor of future performance.”

In place of asking hypothetical questions (E.g., “How will you handle …,”) interviewers ask specific questions (E.g., “Describe a time when you had to …”) to elicit concrete examples of desired behaviors from the past. For further details and sample questions, see my earlier article on behavioral interviewing.

6 Steps to Answer Behavioral Interview Questions

1. Listen to the question carefully. Commonly, behavioral interview questions tend be longwinded and may sometimes sound vague (blame an overuse of adjectives, adverbs and trendy language.) Here is an example: “Good problem-solving often includes a careful review of the substantial facts and weighing of options before making a decision. Give me an instance of how you reached a practical business decision by an organized assessment of the facts and weighing of options.”
2. Ensure you understand the question before you begin to answer. You may paraphrase the question and ask the interviewer if you understand it correctly. If necessary, ask the interviewer to repeat the question. Do not, however, ask the interviewer to repeat every question — the interviewer may question your ability to listen and comprehend.
3. Organize your answer. Allow yourself five to eight seconds to collect your thoughts and structure your answer. Interviewers appreciate this break — they could use this time to drink some water, review their notes or rest their hands from note-taking.
4. State your answer. Attempt to conclude your answer in about three minutes. Three minutes is long enough to relate a story comprehensively and short enough to hold the interviewer’s attention.
5. Do not digress from your plan. Resist the temptation to think of new details as you state the answer. By sticking to the details and structure you had planned for, you can provide a consistent and well-reasoned answer. Be concise. Do not ramble on.
6. Answer follow-up questions. In response to your three-minute answer, the interviewer may pose follow-up questions. These questions can be confirming questions that require simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers or clarifying questions that require brief answers.

Answering a Question: Use the STAR Technique to Narrate an Experience

In behavioral interviewing, every answer should specifically address the skill being addressed. Your answer should relate an experience from a previous job assignment, project, academic studies or community work.

Present a diverse set of experiences. Suppose that you are asked six behavioral questions during a thirty-minute interview. Using a distinct context and/or experience for each question will help you portray a diversity of skills, interests and experiences.

Begin by examining the question: what is the purpose of the question, what specific skill is the question trying to address? Then, pick an experience that you could describe to address the question at hand. In your mind, recollect specifics of your experience. Structure your answer and narrate your experience using the four steps in the ‘STAR’ technique.

1. ‘S’ for Situation : Commence your answer with the background to your experience. Detail the circumstances of your involvement. Provide sufficient detail to develop a context to the rest of your narration.
2. ‘T’ for Task: Describe the challenge at hand: what needed to be done, what should have been done. Detail the outcome that was expected, constraints or conditions that needed to be satisfied.
3. ‘A’ for Action: Elaborate your specific action in response to the challenge. Specify analytical work, team effort or project coordination. Use ‘I’ and ‘we’ statements as appropriate [more details here.]
4. ‘R’ for Results: Explain the results of your efforts: what did you accomplish, what did you learn, how did your managers and team respond, how did your organization recognize you. Wherever possible, quantify your achievements and improvements — e. g., “20% improvement in …” or “reduced manufacturing costs by 1.5 million dollars per year … .”

An Example: Using the STAR Technique to Narrate an Experience

Consider a question suggested by authors Jack and Suzy Welch in a recent Business Week article on recruiting for leadership positions.

• Question: “Have you ever had to define yourself in the midst of criticism, and did you succeed?”

Below is a concise four-step ‘STAR’ answer to this interview question. This question illustrates the ability of the interviewee to listen to feedback, adapt as a manager and lead teams well.

1. ‘S’ for Situation: “My first job after business school was to lead a product development team at ABC Corporation. One of my responsibilities involved participating in weekly product planning meetings that decided on product features. After the meeting, I would meet with my staff and delegate the programming tasks. Since I am an experienced programmer, I would explain details of how each feature needed to be programmed. I expected my staff to write the programs in C++, test and debug. We seemed to work very well as a team.”
2. ‘T’ for Task: “Three months later, my manager had collected feedback from my staff. In my performance review, my manager observed that I could improve my delegation skills. I was surprised to receive this feedback. I had believed that I was good at delegating given that I would detail my expectations of each staff-member and list every step he/she needed to work on. It believed my staff was productive and continually gained knowledge from my coaching. I thanked my manager for the feedback and promised to reflect on my delegating style and consider a change.”
3. ‘A’ for Action: “I reflected on my delegation approach and realized two problems. Firstly, I assigned work to my staff only in terms of steps to take. I had habitually failed to describe the background of product features we wanted to develop and explain how their work would improve the overall product. My staff would do just what I had asked them to do. Secondly, in telling my staff how to complete each assignment, I was micromanaging. This may have tended to limit my staff’s initiative and reduced opportunities to advance their programming skills. During the next staff meeting, I thanked my staff for the feedback and acknowledged I would change. Then, each week, I explained the context to every product feature we wanted to develop, described the task in terms of outcomes and asked my staff how we could approach each task.”
4. ‘R’ for Results: “My staff was very excited about the opportunity to propose ideas, brainstorm and choose a preferred way of going about their work. It was no longer my idea they would work on; it was their own idea and their own approach. They were more enthusiastic about their work and realized they were an integral part of something bigger than themselves. During the next quarterly meeting, my manager praised me for empowering my team.”

Concluding Thoughts

In answering interview questions, the best way to impress an interviewer is to discuss your credentials and accomplishments in terms of personal success stories. The ‘STAR’ technique is probably the best method to structure answers to interview questions. By following this simple technique, you can narrate direct, meaningful, personalized experiences that best identify your qualifications.

Recommended Reading

• Introduction to behavioral interviewing and sample questions
• Avoiding second-person answers in interviews
• Avoid too many ‘I-I-I’ or ‘We-We-We’ answers in interviews
• Delegating outcomes, not just tasks

***See other articles related to job search, job-hunting tips, interviewing, hiring, recruiting, job interviews, interview questions, behavioral interviewing

Preamble

The last two articles discussed the popular ‘sandwich technique‘ for giving interpersonal feedback. The first article introduced the sandwich feedback technique. The second article critiqued this method and discussed three common mistakes that render the sandwich technique ineffective.

This follow-up article will introduce an effective feedback technique and list links for further information.

This article focuses on manager-to-employee feedback. However this feedback model can be the foundation for giving feedback in other interpersonal contexts as well—between peers or between spouses, for instance.

The Manager Tools Feedback Model

Manager Tools is a widely-admired suite of management techniques to help shape effective managers and leaders. The weekly podcasts on this site feature Manager Tools’ principals, Mark Horstman and Mike Auzenne, discussing their tools and tips to help audiences advance their managerial and leadership skills. The discussion forums are useful as well.

Perhaps the most popular and most effective of the Manager Tools ideas is the effective feedback model. Here is a summary of the four steps in this feedback technique.

1. Ask an employee whether they are open to some feedback. Example: “Jack, may I give you some feedback?”
2. Describe specific behavior you saw, heard, or read about. Example: “Jack, when you roll your eyes in meetings when others talk; when you say “you guys don’t get it”; when you come late to meetings and leave in the middle…”
3. Describe the impact of the behavior. Once you have described what you observed, tell them what you felt or what impact it had on the company, project, or team. Example: “Jack, when you roll your eyes and tell others they “don’t get it”, here’s what happens. We lose good people. You lose opportunities you want, like that last move that you didn’t get.”
4. Discuss next steps. Even with affirmative (positive) feedback, state “Good work. Keep it up.” For corrective (negative) feedback, ask open-ended or leading questions to encourage the employee to suggest change. Example: “What can you do about this? How can I help you?”

Further Information

Here are links to podcasts and references for further information on the Manager Tools effective feedback model.

• Effective feedback model: podcast on the four-step technique and the corresponding summary sheet.
• Podcast on frequently asked questions on the effective feedback model
• Podcast on tailoring feedback to distinct employee communication styles.
• Podcast on adapting the feedback model for giving feedback to peers.
• A list of podcasts for advancing managerial and leadership’s skills.

Call for Action

Feedback is a central component of the manager-employee relationship. Employees get better at their jobs only when their managers give them timely, relevant and forthright feedback — both affirmative and corrective feedback.

Use the Manager Tools feedback model to enhance your feedback skills and communicate effectively with employees.

***See other articles related to Giving feedback, criticism, manager skills, interpersonal skills, praise

Preamble

Yesterday’s article presented the popular ‘sandwich technique‘ for giving interpersonal feedback. This follow-up article will critique this method and discuss three common mistakes that render the sandwich technique ineffective. The next article will introduce an effective feedback technique with pointers for further information.

These discussions and examples focus on manager-to-employee feedback. This analysis is, however, relevant to other interpersonal contexts–between peers or between spouses, for instance.

Mary Kay Ash on the Sandwich Technique

Mary Kay Ash, American entrepreneur and founder of Mary Kay Cosmetics, discusses the sandwich feedback technique in her popular book ‘People Management.’

Sandwich every bit of criticism between two heavy layers of praise. … A manager should be able to tell someone when something is wrong without bruising an ego in the process.

Never giving criticism without praise is a strict rule for me. No matter what you are criticizing, you must find something good to say — both before and after. This is called sandwich technique.

Try to praise in the beginning and then again after discussing the problem. You don’t subject people to harsh criticism or provoke anger.

Common Mistake 1: Praise is substantial and obscures the criticism

Consider the following case. Surya was the head of a committee that organized the annual family picnic at his company. The committee exceeded the picnic budget by 35%. Surya’s boss uses the sandwich technique to criticize him for his failure to control expenditure.

• Praise: “Surya, our management was very impressed with the attendance at our annual family picnic. The weather was great. The catered food was excellent. The activities for children were wonderful. You even organized contests for children and family.”
• Criticism: “By the way, you overspent by 35%. You should check your expenses and try to be within budget.”
• Praise: “I understand you worked very hard to coordinate the logistics. I congratulate you for doing a remarkable job leading the committee and for your enthusiasm. Thank you for a job well done.”

In the above example, the praise is substantial and obscures the criticism. Surya may neglect the criticism since the criticism is insignificant— therefore, lost—when sandwiched between “heavy layers of praise.”

Common Mistake 2: Praise is trivial or just-for-sake and serves no function

Suppose that Charlie led a brainstorming meeting for a new product. One of his new fresh-from-college employees proposed an idea that was not practicable. Charlie was annoyed with the idea and responded, “That is a stupid idea. You are thoughtless. You have been here for less than a week. I don’t think you are knowledgeable enough to contribute to our discussions here.”

Janet, Charlie’s boss, observed this interaction. After the meeting, she wanted to criticize Charlie for condemning the new employee in the presence of several other employees. Janet recalled the sandwich feedback technique she had learnt. However, she could not conceive praise for Charlie. Hastily, she stated something trivial just for the sake of paving the way to her criticism.

• Praise: “Charlie, good job organizing the meeting.”
• Criticism: “I noticed that you openly called the new employee’s idea “foolish” and dismissed his idea. Don’t you realize he is fresh from college? Did you see his reaction? He felt dejected and showed no enthusiasm during the rest of the meeting. He was probably there to meet many people from our department and learn how we manage projects. How can you expect him to feel happy about joining your team? I have noticed that you jump to criticize other people’s ideas in meetings. Look, a good manager encourages participation in meetings. I think you should apologize to the new employee. [Pause]“
• Praise: “Hmm … anyway. Good meeting. I liked your flowchart.”

As in the above example, for the sake of sandwiching their criticism, managers tend to offer unrelated—often trivial—praises when faced with the challenge of criticizing their employees. Such praise is inconsequential and, therefore, defeats the purpose of the sandwich technique.

Common Mistake 3: Employees get tuned in to the praise-criticism-praise pattern

Once managers learn and use the sandwich feedback technique a few times, employees recognize the praise-criticism-praise pattern. Employees realize that the managers offer criticism after initiating their conversations with praise. Subsequently they learn to discount this praise since such praise is just a lead-in to the criticism.

Conclusions: Sandwich feedback is often ineffective

Frequently, from the mistakes explained above, the sandwich technique amounts to undercutting praise with criticism. A praise followed by criticism undermines the positive impact of praise and weakens the significance of the corrective feedback.

Sandwich feedback is perhaps best used to help new managers develop feedback skills: to provide affirmative feedback to encourage employees to repeat desired behaviors and to offer corrective feedback to influence change. Once managers are at ease with giving feedback, they can focus on discussing what their employees do right and defer offering corrective feedback for other conversations.

Effective feedback is timely, relevant and forthright. Tomorrow’s article will introduce an effective feedback technique.

***Related Article: On the use of the word ‘but‘ to undercut praise with criticism. ‘But’ as in “Great job on the PowerPoint presentation Tom, but, you used small fonts — the audience was not able to read text on your slides.”

***See other articles related to Giving feedback, criticism, manager skills, interpersonal skills, praise