>Setting the stage
>Value in nontraditional feedback
>Sincere, timely, and specific
>New ideas worth exploring

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A little creative criticism can go a long way, but avoiding a negative feedback frenzy can be difficult. Learn what pitfalls to avoid and some strategies to help ease the process.

Anyone who has given or received a performance review or other constructive criticism in the workplace knows the experience can go downhill faster than a slacker on a snowboard. Regardless of the reviewer's good intentions and the recipient's best efforts to suspend judgment and focus on non-defensive listening, several realities of human behavior tend to reduce the efficacy of the process.

First, most people are inclined to see the truths they are looking for. And even the most thoughtful and appropriately timed critique might not be clearly understood. Body language, tone of voice, inflection, emotional intensity, degree of eye contact, and other subtleties affect our interpretation of the message. The natural tendency of many people to avoid confrontation, combined with the stilted nature of countless senior-and-subordinate relationships and serious personality differences between many managers and their lieutenants, also predisposes bosses to avoid specific criticism and couch feedback in broad generalities. A meticulous manager and a subordinate slob aren't likely to ever get along, let alone clear the clutter and exchange useful feedback on job performance. All of these factors tend to make formal performance reviews, and even less-structured employee feedback, too infrequent, too impersonal, and too inflated.

Setting the stage

With the approach of the season for annual performance appraisals, it's a good time for employees to drop their egos and be willing to learn from honest feedback thoughtfully delivered in private. Likewise, managers should recognize that what they see as helpful feedback or coaching could be seen as an attack on an overworked and underappreciated staff assistant who may feel goals are poorly communicated, expectations are uncertain, and direction is rarely offered.

In his seminal work, Process Consultation Revisited (Addison-Wesley, 1999), Ed Schein, a professor of management at MIT's Sloan School of Management and a recognized expert on organizational culture and process consultation, reminds bosses at all levels that "feedback always implies some goals on the part of the receiver." Accordingly, one of the most serious shortcomings in senior-and-subordinate relationships is failing to agree on goals to be achieved and performance standards to be met. Building on this imperative, Schein emphasizes that "if the boss and subordinate disagree on goals and performance standards, or if [goals and standards] are not clear, corrective information from the boss may be perceived as irrelevant information by the subordinate."

To add an extra point to Schein's comments, it's illustrative to borrow a term from aviation, shared mental model, which refers to the importance of both pilots in a two-person cockpit having the same understanding of how a particular phase of flight is to be executed. Flights in which the pilots lack a shared mental model of the task at hand frequently end with tragic results.

Similarly, before any feedback can be delivered in a helpful way, the giver and the receiver must have had a conversation about the goals the receiver should be trying to achieve. Keep in mind that a good golf coach typically will ask a trainee what he or she wants to work on today, rather than launching into a stream of corrective feedback.

Moreover, goal consensus is a prerequisite to build trust between senior and subordinate; some degree of trust is necessary for a subordinate to feel secure in the relationship and lower his or her defenses, thereby setting the stage for effective feedback. Employees should remember, a performance review is also the beginning of their next campaign for a raise. Reaching consensus regarding goals and the criteria to be used in measuring goal attainment are important steps in determining the size of next year's raise.

Value in nontraditional feedback

Many successful people report they have received life-altering feedback from nontraditional sources. During public remarks several years ago, George Fisher, a former CEO at Motorola and Eastman Kodak and now a director at Eli Lilly and General Motors, said the best feedback he ever received was "from bosses who took the opportunity to give guidance to me on an as-needed basis - while riding in cars to meetings, or on airplanes, or in the office hallway."

Building on this theme, frequent and informal conversations on the job are a wonderful opportunity to "walk in the shoes of others and truly listen to employees and try to understand their point of view," says Ned Barnholt, chairman emeritus of Agilent Technologies, a California-based maker of test and measurement equipment that is ranked No. 9 in Business Ethic's
(www.business-ethics.com) "100 Best Corporate Citizens List."

This writer also had a favorable experience with the value of impromptu feedback while leading a large military organization several years ago. My 65 direct reports were a confident and enthusiastic group of pilots and managers with specialized skills. The widely dispersed nature of our operations made it a challenge for me to get to know each of them on a personal basis.

Informal sessions gave my direct reports a chance to talk about what was bugging them, so tensions were less likely to build up in our organization. In a more casual atmosphere, I found much less resistance to criticism and and a greater willingness to accept my coaching.

These casual discussions also gave me an important window into my subordinates' personal lives and professional aspirations, which helped me guide their careers in appropriate directions. Casual banter helped me define and maintain the right degree of managerial control without undermining my subordinates' authority. Dr. Nathaniel Branden (www.nathanielbranden.net), a clinical psychologist and management consultant who has written extensively on the importance of personal responsibility and accountability, emphasizes this latter point in Taking Responsibility (Fireside, 1996) when he reminds his readers that "excessive managing is the enemy of autonomy and creativity."

Sincere, timely, and specific

Regardless of whether your personal style inclines you to more formal or less formal settings, the feedback you provide to your lieutenants must be sincere, timely, and specific. If goal consensus and clear expectations are the foundation of trust between senior and subordinate, then certainly trust is a precondition for the recipient to believe in the sincerity of the giver. Schein reminds readers that, "If the recipient believes the giver is genuinely interested in helping, she is more likely to listen than if she doubts or mistrusts the giver's motives." Accordingly, the essential elements in a senior-and-subordinate relationship become clear: precise goals and expectations, trust, and sincerity.

Timeliness and specificity also are important elements. The more feedback is anchored in behavior or outcomes that both the senior and the subordinate have recently observed, the less likely it is to be misunderstood. In general, you should give feedback as soon as possible after you observe behavior that you want to correct or reinforce - delay only long enough to gain all of the necessary information. However, if the behavior you observed was particularly upsetting, give everyone sufficient time to calm down, and wait for a teachable moment. Remember Colin Powell's rule: "It isn't as bad as you think. It will look better in the morning."

Schein offers the following example of specific and timely feedback: Instead of a negative, vague, and general criticism such as "You don't handle your people well," consider a positive and specific comment such as "I noticed your people are more productive when you involve them in decisions and listen to their points-of-view."

General George Patton's most recent biographer, Alex Axelrod, while writing in Patton, a Biography (Palgrave MacMillan, 2006) noted that Patton "always celebrated the high performance of subordinates and, when he corrected them, he did so with concrete criticism and practical advice."

New ideas worth exploring

If you find annual performance reviews more of a burden than a benefit, experimentwith nontraditional approaches. The so-called 360-degree performance review is a contemporary initiative used to provide employees objective feedback from a variety of sources and solicits feedback from peers and subordinates as well as bosses. Carol Hymowitz, a nationally recognized expert on workplace relationships, finds that "employees tend to be more thoughtful and fair when assessing their bosses, especially where the bosses are open to constructive criticism." It's normal for these inputs to be submitted anonymously, so staffers don't have to worry about retribution.
Managers also might want to experiment with a technique used by Ian Henry, chief executive of London-based BTG. At periodic intervals, Henry solicits feedback by asking his direct reports and board members to tell him "two things I should stop doing, two things I should keep doing, and two things I should start doing." By using this technique, Henry learned that his tendency to propose multiple ideas had employees running in too many directions. "I've learned to distinguish between ideas I think are very important and those which are only suggestions."

Sometimes feedback stings, but it invariably leads to better ideas and better leadership, both of which are essential for you and your organization to grow and prosper.

About the author: Jim Carman is a graduate of the MIT Sloan School of Management and a retired Navy captain. He writes and lectures about career transition topics.