Strategies For Giving Feedback To Your Leadership Team

Posted on: 27 February 2018

Hopefully, you've built a culture of leadership where your managers feel secure with receiving feedback from you and each other. However, at the same time, your leaders are only human. Thus, it is important to take care in how you present feedback, who it comes from, the content of the feedback, and the environment where it's presented. Here are some tips on delivering feedback that will be constructive and well-received. 

Make It Concrete

Concrete feedback is always most effective. Statements that aren't backed up with evidence are easy to refute or shirk off. When you let managers know how you are monitoring their success, they have some real data to work with to improve their performance. They know what concrete actions to avoid in the future. 

Let It Come From Employees

You don't always have to be the one to give feedback to managers or leaders. Subordinates can be very effective at determining what leaders are doing well and poorly. And this is a way of distributing respect; when subordinates feel like they have a say in how they are lead, they will be happier in their positions and become more invested in the success of the team. 

Let It Come From Outside

Leadership team assessment can be another effective tool for delivering feedback. It sidesteps the issue of intraoffice politics in feedback. It is objective and third party. Outside leadership team assessment specialists can be very effective at critiquing communication styles, team productivity, and other factors. And they deliver the news in a professional fashion. There is less chance of your employees getting defensive or holding a grudge against you or another team member. 

Don't Tie It to Reward or Punishment

It is tempting to tie good feedback to a raise. However, this sets people up to be defensive about receiving feedback. Are you prepared to give a raise every time someone does a good job, for fear of your feedback not being seen as genuine if it doesn't come with a raise? Probably not. At the same time, negative feedback shouldn't be tied to anything negative happening with the job or the pay. Opportunities for feedback should stand alone, so that they can be digested and reflected upon. 

Giving feedback to a leadership team is always a tough thing to do. You don't want to knock anyone's confidence, but you want the team to be the best it can be. Next time, try some of these strategies. Contact companies like Envision Global Leadership, Inc. that offer leadership team assessment for more tips.

Share