We all need people who give us feedback.
That’s how we improve.”
Bill Gates
When teaching feedback skills in my graduate leadership class, I start by asking how many of the students have kids? Keep you hand up if they are teens? Keep you hand up if they keep their room clean? Those with their hands up, please share how you redirect your teen’s behavior.
This is a transferrable life skill, and learning to do it well in one arena can carry over to all arenas. As a leader, I didn’t start out giving effective redirection feedback. So I am grateful to all the staff who helped me develop and improve. For instance, Laura taught me that effective Redirection Feedback requires clarity and planning.
Laura was my office manager, and her desk was always piled up and unsightly. As I walked by one day, I told her to clean it up and keep it clean. Laura followed me into my office and asked, “Do I ever misplace anything? Do you ever ask for something that I can’t locate right away? Am I in the public arena where our customers can see my desk?”
No, no and no were my answers. Her messy desk was a personal issue for me, but it wasn’t a performance issue or an organizational goal issue. Thanks Laura, I got it!
REFLECT:
Do you ever give redirection feedback based on your personal values?
Do you align your redirection feedback with organizational objectives?
Before giving Redirection Feedback, prepare / plan by asking these questions
* What is my objective / goal for giving this feedback?
* How / why is it important to the organizational goals?
* How / why is this important to the person receiving it?
Many people in leadership positions – team lead, supervisor, manager and executive – express discomfort with “criticizing” others. Redirection is not criticism: it is a form of support, and research studies prove its value.
Studies show employees enjoy positive feedback, but they view it as less helpful or valuable than Redirection Feedback. They want to know “where they stand” and “how they can improve”. This makes Redirection Feedback supportive because it provides clarity on how employees are performing provides guidance and support for positive change and improvement.
Providing effective and motivating Redirection Feedback
* requires planning
* Improves with practice
* is specific to the organizational / team mission, goals and objectives
* is supportive and improvement based
* Includes consequences
Studies also show the lack of Redirection Feedback can lead to low team morale and performance, even with high performers. When non-performers are not redirected:
* Performers lose confidence and trust in leaders that don’t take care of the problem. They wonder if the leader will support them when they need it.
* Performers resent having to cover for and “pick up the slack” for nonperformers. They wonder why they should be working so hard, when the ones not working are getting by with it.
* Performers feel punished because they get called on to do extra tasks.
* Performers resent being treated the same as non-performers, since the leader “rewards” them equally.
Punishing the performers and rewarding the non-performers is a common activity in every place I have worked.
For instance, one staff member is always on time, does outstanding work, and stays late to complete paperwork. In contrast, another drifts in late and leaves on-the-dot. When an important last minute task arises that involves staying late, who is asked to stay? Or a report is poor quality and needs to be revised, who is asked to work on it? The performer is asked to do the work. The performer is punished – given extra hours and work. The non-performer is rewarded by being allowed to continue as usual. And most likely, both get paid the same.
Another form of punishing the performer is having team meetings to go over problems that are created by one person or a minority of the team. The leader discusses the problems in general terms and states things have to change.
Only the non-performer(s) deserves this feedback, and only in private. The performers are punished by having to attend a meeting that doesn’t apply to them, and by having to listen to negative feedback they do not deserve. The performers deserve to be called to a meeting that recognizes their performance and praises their efforts!
To remedy this behavior means shifting from a micro level mindset – “criticizing” an individual – to a macro level mindset – focusing on organizational goal achievement. This is what Laura had me do – shift from criticizing an individual to thinking about her performance in relation to organizational outcomes. Making this mindset shift improves leadership skills and outcomes exponentially!
Shifting employees to the macro level lays the foundation for performance feedback. Having all employees relate their performance to organizational outcomes creates clarity for priorities and standards. It can be an immediate mind shift, power shift, and culture change.
APPLY:
For one week, Include organizational objectives in communication about projects, tasks, outcomes, and performance.
For instance, I led a division that dealt with the general public, so our mission and several of our goals addressed providing quality customer service. I told the staff if they weren’t on the front line serving the public, they had to be able to explain – in performance objectives – how their positions supported the front line employees who did serve the public.
The staff who have the most trouble adjusting to this way of establishing performance objectives have usually been the “power players”. In this instance, the IT manager resisted the shift in performance objectives. She was used to determining the technology needs and processes. She was not about to be moved to a support role for the service providers who would now be identifying the priorities of equipment, software, and programming. (Needless to say, I gained huge appreciation from one group – the service providers – and lost it just as hugely with the IT manager. The IT staff let meknow they agreed with the new direction, however.)
(See other blogs on Redirection and Termination Models)
