[0:08] I'm recording this in November and welcome back to Do Something Different. I say it's November because we're entering into what is normally the performance management season. So this is the time to do performance reviews, evaluate people, and do that dreaded thing, give feedback. I want to talk today about feedback and how you can be more effective at giving feedback. Because let's be honest, most people are not very good at it or they just avoid it entirely. and maybe those two things are connected.

[0:40] But it makes sense when you think about it because giving someone feedback feels like a risky proposition because you're putting your relationship to some degree at jeopardy. You're doing something uncomfortable. You're projecting onto the other person. They're not going to like what it is that you have to say. All of these things create this sense of anxiety or apprehension or fear. And when we're afraid of something, what do we do? We avoid it. It reminds me of one of my phrases about procrastination, which is procrastination is not a time management issue. It's an emotion management issue or a personal management issue. It's about managing yourself, knowing what's going on and being able to manage yourself. And that's exactly what happens here with feedback. We avoid feedback because it's uncomfortable. And when it's uncomfortable, we just don't do it. We put it excuse, a reason to be busy and to not get to it. Totally normal and totally human. But one of the things about becoming a better leader is dialing up your self-awareness so you can see that pattern in yourself. You can see it and recognize and say, oh, look at this. I know I need to give feedback to, let's call it George, and I'm avoiding it. And it's in the avoiding of that feedback of George. when you recognize it, that gives you the opportunity to do something different. So that's just one of the reasons why many people avoid giving feedback is because it can feel uncomfortable.

[2:09] A second reason that oftentimes people avoid feedback is because it may not feel like it's really part of the culture. I know a lot of companies are very supportive and they've got kind of a positive culture and companies are really trying to build that positive culture these days so that employees feel engaged and motivated and happy, especially with the hybrid office situation or even some companies that are now mandating everybody to come back to work. They want the office environment to feel positive. And somehow in our head, giving feedback can feel like it's not a positive environment. And so that's another reason where some people can point to the culture and say, you know, this isn't really the kind of culture that gives feedback.

[2:52] Another thing that I have seen being in the corporate world is this, well, it's not my problem to deal with mentality. That's super easy to adopt when the person doesn't work for you. So it's some other person on a different team. It could be a peer. It might even be your boss. And it's so easy to say, that's not my problem. I'm not going to deal with it. I've even seen that dynamic happen a lot in corporate environments when the person does work for you. But these people who are underperformers get passed around from one manager to the next because nobody wants to deal with it.

[3:26] These are all patterns, trends, things that happen when people just kind of go along with the flow. They say, I'm going to just take the path of least resistance and I'm going to, if I feel nervous about giving the feedback or it feels like it's not aligned with the culture or it's not really my problem, I'm just going to go with the flow and just not do it. And frankly, sometimes it feels easier and more fun and more satisfying to just complain about the person. We've all seen that. We've all been a part of that, I think, is the complaining or the gossip that happens around work. One of the things that I did that fundamentally changed my approach to feedback is I made a commitment to myself. That commitment was to say, if I'm willing to talk about someone when they're not in the room, I have to be willing to tell them the same thing to their face. And if I'm not willing to have that conversation to their face, then I'm not going to talk about them when they're not in the room.

[4:22] I invite you to make a similar commitment to yourself. And that is a commitment to take action towards giving feedback. Because when you've got that complaint, when you want to talk about someone, you can, but when you're in the midst of that, you realize your commitment and you remember your commitment and you say, now I've got to go have that conversation with the person directly.

[4:43] Now let's talk about how to do that effectively, how to have that conversation effectively.

[4:49] The first thing I think is important when you think about feedback is to fundamentally change your mindset. Because so many people think about feedback as this negative thing, and that's what creates the sense of anxiety or nervousness or fear about giving feedback. They expect the other person won't respond well. But feedback is truly an opportunity to improve performance for the other person, and that's going to have an impact on you, and it's going to impact the whole team. So think about feedback as something that you're doing to support the other person and come in with that mindset. Now, I think I'm going to give you a couple of steps to go through an effective feedback process. The first is very simply to ask permission. And that permission doesn't have to be, can I give you feedback? It can be, is this a good time? I've got some feedback I want to share with you. Is this a good time? Or should we set up a time later?

[5:42] That's the first piece. Just get their engagement and get their permission. So that they're engaged in the process and they agree to the feedback. The second point is to articulate that mindset, that mindset of, hey, this is not about punishment. This is not about criticism. This is about wanting you to improve. This is about caring about you enough to say, I wanna tell you this because I want you to improve and that's gonna help you. It's gonna help me. It's gonna help the rest of the team. Everyone's gonna be better for it. So my intent here is to elevate you and elevate

[6:12] the whole team by giving you this feedback. So that's the second point. Number one, get their permission. Number two, share your intent.

[6:20] The third step is actually to deliver the feedback. And I'm going to give you what I think is a great, simple model about giving feedback. And it's COIN, C-O-I-N. It starts with C, which is the context. This is the situation. This is the environment in which this thing happened that I want to give you feedback about. That's the context. O is the observation. This is what I observed. Now, the key here is to stick to facts. Stick to things that the other person will agree with. You said this in the meeting. You raised your voice in the meeting. You didn't participate. You came late. Your delivery of this project was late. Whatever that observation is, you want it to be factual, not judgment.

[7:05] And that's where a lot of people get wrong. Go off. Like you're irresponsible. Well, that's a judgment, right? The other person may not agree with that. But if you say you didn't deliver your work on time for these three deliverables, that's going to be hard to disagree with as long as you got your facts straight. So O is the observation, what did you observe? I in the coin model is impact. And the impact is how did that impact the team? How does that impact your performance? How does that impact other people? So you articulate why it's important that you're bringing this up. What is the impact of that? And then the N of the coin model is next steps. And this is a collaborative thing. You don't tell the person the next steps, but you say, talk together about how can we address this? Because this is something that's worth improving. It's worth investing on. And I'd like to get your engagement in agreeing on what are the next steps.

[7:56] Very simple, C-O-I-N, context, observation, impact, and next steps. And the key here is to avoid the judgment, avoid the labels of irresponsible or poor performance or any of those things that are very vague and to get specific about what do you observe and what is the impact of that observation?

[8:17] I want to leave you with this simple feedback model and invite you once again to make that commitment. Because what we all find in the work world is that we're talking to people about others who are not in the room. It happens all the time and that's fine. But make the commitment to yourself that if this is some kind of conversation you're having about another person that is constructive in nature, that's complaining about them, that's talking about something they're not doing well, make the commitment to yourself to bring that back to the other person and share the feedback with them in the spirit of elevating their performance, investing in them, giving them the opportunity to see something that maybe they didn't see and

[8:56] improving the performance of the whole team. Use the COIN model and have a great time giving feedback.