Feedback You Need as a Leader

Most working people have experienced reviews, feedback, and progress reports in some form from a manager. For most, the feedback is generally top down, meaning you get feedback from your boss, you then give feedback to your direct reports, and so on. It happens, but it’s not commonplace to have feedback coming from bottom up.

In another article, I reviewed 360 performance reviews to accommodate all around feedback, however, this article is focused specifically on the type of feedback a leader should seek and tips to get honest feedback. It can be a challenge to get honest feedback from direct reports, but if you do, how do you ensure it's honest and what are the areas to benefit you the most?

Tips for receiving honest feedback

1. You have to provide a psychologically safe environment

If people feel their job will be on the line, you will never get honest input. Even if you say their job isn’t on the line, they may still think it so as a leader, you have to be certain you are taking actions that align with what you are saying. You have to stand by the psychologically safe environment and not bring this feedback up at a later point in a negative way.

2. Be specific about the type of feedback you need

It can be helpful to ask about a certain project, or how a meeting was handled versus waiting for an annual meeting to discuss the entire year. This can be more casual, making it more likely for people to be honest, and it should be more detailed if it’s more timely. Additionally, the person giving feedback may not know what you are looking for and this can make it stressful for that person.

3. Think about how you ask for feedback

Rather than asking in a general way, you could ask “What’s one thing that I could do better to support you?” This makes it easier because not only is it specifically about supporting, it’s simply one thing. If you say instead, “What can I be doing better”, that is broad and likely to get a ‘nothing’ answer. Another way to approach this is by saying something like “Please tell me the thing you think I don’t want to hear.”

4. Request the good and the bad

It’s good for everyone to hear positive as well as negative. There could be things you are doing that are helping people and if you don’t take the time to ensure positives are being talked about, you wouldn’t know to continue doing it. Make sure when you walk away, you are perfectly clear about what an improvement would like in the negative areas.

5. Be clear of distraction

Reviewing leadership is a risk to the person doing the reviewing so be sure to avoid your phone and other distractions. You asked for feedback, make sure you are paying attention.

6. Do not get defensive

Ask if something is unclear, but make sure to avoid going back and forth and arguing about the feedback. It’s another viewpoint, try to learn something from it. Even if you feel strongly it’s incorrect, there is probably at least a little bit true in there that you can think on. If the person giving feedback picks up on anger or defense, they will shy away from this in the future and you can guarantee the word will be passed around the office to be careful when asked for feedback.

7. Think about the feedback and determine a plan to take action

Take the time to reflect. If you repeatedly ask for feedback and brush it off, the people providing it to you may not take it seriously either. It can work well to designate a person for feedback who will regularly meet with you to hold you accountable to ensure progress is happening.

8. Stay on top of it and provide progress updates

Showing gratitude for someone taking the time to give feedback can be done with a thank you, but even more useful is to keep in communication on the progress and real examples. Something I really like is the STAR framework. Situation, Task, Action, Result. If you answer those four areas with your examples of progress, it’s very clear what was happening when you attempted to use the feedback, what you did that is an improvement from prior behavior and then of course, how it ended or resulted to determine if it was a success.

STAR example

Feedback: Delegation needs work to avoid bottlenecks

The next time the topic of progress comes up, this example could be used.

Situation: This week, I had three projects to complete, one of which is not really part of my job description anymore.

Task: I delegated and gave Jane one of them.

Action: I trained Jane and kept myself open at the end of each day for progress reports.

Result: Jane completed the project and will now be taking it over going forward, freeing up my time to work on other strategic projects.

What type of feedback do you need?

So that is a lot of information about getting honest feedback, but what about the types of things to ask for feedback about? This next section is geared towards those in executive director and higher positions but you may find it applies when slightly modified to many other roles. There are endless questions out there to review performance, but for leaders, there are some specific areas in addition to the typical areas to look at. This includes areas of financial, leadership, strategy, metrics, talent, culture, innovation, relationships and board partnerships if applicable.

1. What level is employee engagement at?
2. How well are we doing determining key metrics and regularly reviewing and taking action?
3. Do I embody the company values and inspire others to do the same? How do I show this?
4. Am I providing timely and useful feedback?
5. How am I doing in providing a clear vision for work?
6. How well am I leading by example?
7. How am I doing in providing diverse perspectives?
8. What level of work went into risk management this year?
9. What type of focus was put on developing the team?
10. How am I doing at building relationships with customers, vendors, and other stakeholders?
11. Is the company strategy clear, planned out, and public for the team?
12. Are we innovative enough and paying attention to market trends? Adding new products appropriately?
13. How well are we communicating with the board?

In summary, if you are in a leadership position requesting feedback from a direct report, always remember this was a risk for them to be candid. The feedback should be taken seriously, reflected upon and a plan to work on some or all of it should be put in place. The questions at the end of this article are meant to serve as inspiration for areas to cover when asking for feedback.