Learning to give feedback
You will have to give feedback regularly in your career, to your manager, to a client, to a supplier, to members of your team or to your colleagues. It is therefore important to be prepared!
What are the reasons for giving feedback? Here are some examples:
- allow the other to improve
- avoid surprises at the end of a project or at the end of the year
- clarify expectations and increase motivation in the team.
There are several methods to give feedback. Today we will discover the STAR method.
The STAR method
The 4 elements of feedback
There are 4 elements in a STAR feedback:
- Situation: you must describe the situation, what, when, who, being as specific as possible
- Tasks: you must describe the expected task or behavior you were expecting
- Action: you must explain how the action did not meet your expectations
- Results: you must explain the impact and consequences of the action you observed
Let's take an example to make it more meaningful:
I don't like it when you don't do what you said, you disrespect us all. You were supposed to do this part of the presentation, your behavior is really uncool!
Effective? Not really. This type of feedback is very general and can lead to conflicts.
Let's apply the STAR method to get more relevant feedback:
- Situation: Yesterday at 6pm, you didn't send your part of the presentation that was due at 7pm
- Task: you had to make the conclusion slides with a detailed analysis and you were the only one working on it
- Action: we had to redo the slides in urgency between 18:30 and 19:00
- Result: everyone was very stressed and the final result was not what the teacher expected
More efficient and relevant, no?
Here are some other tips to improve your feedback.
It is important to suggest solutions to the person. Give them ideas for improvement! Don't just raise a problem.
Don't go for personal attacks, avoid the you or you, use I instead.
For example:
You lack communication vs. I think you need to be more communicative with others
You always send me the elements when I follow up twice vs. I would like to receive the elements in advance
Receive feedback
After talking about giving feedback, let's talk a bit about how to receive feedback. Here are some tips.
Focus on what the person has written, avoid having an emotional reaction! Try to stay calm and analyze the message to understand it well.
Be open to change, think about the message and make sure you understand the feedback and what you could change to improve your behavior.
Identify areas for improvement with this feedback. What actions could you take to correct the situation next time?
Intra-group feedback is similar to a 360-degree evaluation that you may encounter in a company. This type of feedback allows you to compare the image you have of yourself with the image your work group has. It allows you to identify your strengths and areas for improvement. This type of feedback will help you to take a step back on your posture in the group, but also on the things to improve to work better as a team.
Overcome your fear of giving feedback
Tell yourself that you are doing the person a favor, you are giving this feedback to help them improve. When you are in a positive frame of mind to help the person, it becomes much easier to give that feedback.
In all cases, always remain very factual, talk about facts that you have seen and the associated feelings.
Always propose solutions to help the person, this will show the person that you have taken the time to think about their evolution. This approach also demonstrates your leadership by making relevant proposals.