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Preface: This continues the previous post, How to Reduce Stress at Work through Conscious Use of Self: Oprah Winfrey, Jennifer Hudson, and the Blizzard, Part 1, in which I described how Oprah Winfrey coped with an nerve-wracking incident at work. Superstar Jennifer Hudson was unexpectedly late for a scheduled taping of the Oprah Winfrey show, throwing off the entire day’s schedule. The unfolding events were shown in “Episode 116” of Season 25, the highly acclaimed reality show.
In Oprah Winfrey’s 25th and final season of her award-winning show, superstar Jennifer Hudson was scheduled to appear to discuss her amazing weight loss. Unfortunately for all of them, the taping was scheduled a day after the largest blizzard that Chicago had seen in 25 years, resulting in a textbook-like study of stress at work.
A behind-the-scenes look at what transpired that morning was shown on “Episode 116”of Season 25, the highly acclaimed reality show showing the makings of The Oprah Show’s 25th season.
When you see the phrase “motivators at work”, what do you think? Most people may think of things like pay or time off from work. These are external motivators. Others may think of personal characteristics such as work ethic or drive for success. These are internal motivators.
In previous posts, I described the lessons in integrity, self-regulation, and deferred gratification that Morgan, my seven-year-old granddaughter, is learning. She is developing these internal motivators through her participation in National Lemonade Day, a national event designed to teach children entrepreneurial skills and help them develop positive character traits.
Last year, Morgan, then aged 6, participated in the National Lemonade Project, a program established to teach entrepreneurial skills to kids. I described what happened in a previous post, Morgan’s Lemonade Day Project: Integrity as a successful character trait.
Preface: Workplace Undercover is a recurring segment of this blog, featuring a workplace scenario and a response by a guest consultant. This scenario was written by Carole Marmell. Jennifer Joyce, cofounder of LeadershipSmarts responds. This is the third of a three-part segment.
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Part III – Support for Bank’s Feedback System
In Part I of this Workplace UnderCover scenario, Molly, a bank employee, received harsh criticism instead of the supportive feedback she had expected during her yearly performance appraisal. In Part II, Jennifer Joyce, a leadership development coach and consultant, described three steps that Molly might take. In this segment, Jennifer discusses the bank’s role in supporting Molly and her supervisor in giving and receiving more effective feedback.
Jennifer Joyce continues:
As noted at the very beginning of the case study, there is room for Molly’s supervisor and the bank administration to do a better job of providing quality feedback. There are two steps I would recommend they take:
1) Ensure regular and timely feedback
2) Provide training on effective feedback
Ensure Regular and Timely Feedback
The bank’s policy of providing formal performance appraisals after every project as well as yearly appraisals is a great start. When an organization waits until the end of the year to provide evaluation information, they run the risk of losing out on better performance for the entire year. What’s more, the employees stay in the dark for long periods of time without really knowing how they are doing.
The policy of including more people in the appraisal of any one person is also positive in that it promotes more objective opinions than one person can provide.
However, there appears to be an effectiveness gap in the feedback that Molly received from her previous and her current supervisor. That is evidenced by the shock Molly experienced when she received critical feedback from her new supervisor. It’s also curious that Molly feels that the new supervisor is a better communicator than her previous supervisor.
If I were consulting for the bank, I would want to explore what is behind those two concerns. Was the previous supervisor holding the formal appraisal sessions as policy states? How do they know? Is it documented?
Effective Feedback
If the appraisals were regularly held, the next area to explore is the quality of the feedback. The issues listed in the first paragraph suggest that the bank managers and staff don’t have the necessary skill to do a good job in providing meaningful feedback.
If the skill gap proves to be fairly universal for the staff, I would recommend training on how to provide effective feedback in performance evaluations and how to receive feedback for the most positive results.
There are many good points from Chapter 4 in Reframing Change that would be part of that workshop. They include providing feedback that:
Summary
Having the skill to provide truly useful feedback that builds relationships and inspires positive change takes focus and practice. In my experience, it is the most powerful tool an organization has. Frequent quality feedback ensures a culture that recognizes and fixes problems quickly, keeps employees free from the tension of repressed feelings, and keeps communication flowing.
In my work as a leadership consultant, I often think to myself, “If I can just get these folks to talk to each other, my work here is done.”
References: Reframing Change, Building Effective Relationships, Chapter 4
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Jennifer Joyce, cofounder of LeadershipSmarts.com, is a leadership development consultant and coach. She specializes in diversity, continuous quality Improvement, team effectiveness, change leadership, strategic planning, meeting design and facilitation, leadership development and executive coaching. For more information, see www.leadershipsmarts.com
Carole Marmell, LMSW-IPR, C-SWHC, is a hospice social worker.
Preface: Workplace Undercover is a recurring segment of this blog, featuring a workplace scenario and a response by a guest consultant. This scenario was written by Carole Marmell. Jennifer Joyce, cofounder of LeadershipSmarts, responds. This is the second of a three-part segment.
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In the previous post, Molly, a young bank employee, had expected supportive feedback from her manager during her yearly performance appraisal. Instead her manager strongly criticized her and accused her of acting arrogant and believing she is smarter than everyone else. What can Molly do?
Jennifer Joyce responds:
In this scenario, it may be easy to find problems with how Molly’s supervisor and the appraisal committee are providing feedback. The feedback doesn’t appear to have a strengths-based approach or include positive feedback. It is entirely negative. The information is not specific and is full of judgment (“arrogant”) and assumptions (Molly thinks she’s smarter than us). And it sounds as though there may be issues around Molly receiving the direction and guidance she needs to do a good job on unfamiliar tasks. Finally, Molly is blind-sided by the information as she is expecting a glowing evaluation.
Nonetheless, making a case for “poor Molly” would take Molly down the path to powerlessness. Handled well, the situation could prove to be a gold mine for developing interpersonal skills, building more trusting relationships, and gaining new self-awareness about blind spots that have been undermining her success at work. To turn this situation into a positive career win, Molly should focus on three things: engage in self-management, “be in the question,” and “uncollapse” the issues of personal effectiveness from quality of work.
Any of us could easily be knocked off our center when receiving critical feedback, especially when we’re not expecting it. Molly doesn’t appear to be too emotionally triggered, so she has a good chance of managing herself well during the interaction. Nonetheless, she is struggling with how to explain her side of things without sounding defensive and questioning her own sense of reality and belief in herself.
During the discussion, Molly needs to have two main goals: to stay calm and to stay curious. That could be difficult if, like most of us, her natural inclination is to defend herself.
Molly needs to buy a little time to center herself and access her self-management skills. To release her stress, she might want to take a few deep breaths, relax back in her chair, and review the points that her supervisor brought up.
It’s always a good idea to take notes in a feedback discussion, as this will help catch the most important points for review later. In addition, reviewing her notes in the meeting would help Molly buy a little time to think through how best to respond.
Like many of us, Molly may feel pulled to “be in the answer,” which means she will stick with her own assessment of the situation that makes Molly right and others wrong.
But if Molly uses that strategy she loses on many counts. First, she will damage her relationships and her reputation as people will not only see her as arrogant, but also as unwilling to take feedback and make necessary changes. More importantly, she will miss the gift that feedback could provide: the chance to see things about herself that others see and she doesn’t. Without that outside-in view, she could continue to go through life not getting the results she wants and never understanding why.
The way through this dilemma is for Molly to “be in the question,” which means setting aside assumptions in order to become curious about everything that is happening. “What is it that causes people to see me as arrogant?” “What behaviors could they describe to give me a clue about how they experience me?” “Could they give me an example of a negative appraisal I made that seems out of line?” These questions would help her supervisor provide more specific quality feedback.
Molly could act as her own personal anthropologist trying to understand the world through other’s eyes. If she can stay “in the question,” she will jump start new levels of self-awareness that could lead to tremendous personal growth. She may be able to begin changing assumptions and behaviors that are undermining her effectiveness and begin an upward spiral in her professional development.
Molly’s biggest concern is that that her team might consider her work substandard. That would be awful for Molly as she takes great pride in producing high-quality work. It’s an important value of hers.
However, if Molly reviewed her notes, she would realize that her supervisor said nothing about the quality of her work. Rather, the feedback is about the quality of her interpersonal effectiveness. She needs to address the two issues separately: first the interpersonal effectiveness issue, and then the work quality issue.
If she was able to be “in the question” when she received that feedback, she is well on her way to addressing the first issue of interpersonal effectiveness.
But that still leaves Molly worried about perceptions about her work performance. Now that she understands the interpersonal issues, she can ask her supervisor to give her feedback on the quality of her work.
Again, she must stay in the question so she can truly hear what her supervisor has to say. She can use the same skills and ask for specific examples to help her understand the feedback, which may be quite good. She can help her supervisor uncollapse the issues by asking “Now that I understand the concerns regarding my interpersonal effectiveness, could we spend a few minutes reviewing the quality of my work?”
Summary. Here are three steps Molly might take:
But what about the bank’s role? How might the bank as an organization support Molly and her supervisor in giving and receiving more effective feedback? This will be discussed in the next post.
References: Reframing Change, Building Effective Relationships, Chapter 4
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Jennifer Joyce, cofounder of LeadershipSmarts.com, is a leadership development consultant and coach. She specializes in diversity, continuous quality Improvement, team effectiveness, change leadership, strategic planning, meeting design and facilitation, leadership development and executive coaching. For more information, see www.leadershipsmarts.com
Carole Marmell, LMSW-IPR, C-SWHC, is a hospice social worker.
Preface: Workplace Undercover is a recurring segment of this blog, featuring a workplace scenario and a response by a guest consultant. The scenario below was written by Carole Marmell. Jennifer Joyce, cofounder of LeadershipSmarts responds. This is the first of a three-part segment.
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Molly is a 30-year-old bank employee. The bank has a very structured environment, with formal performance appraisals after every project as well as every year. The appraisals go both ways, for supervisors as well as line staff. All appraisals are done by committees consisting of supervisors and line staff. In addition, the supervisors have procedures for providing coaching and feedback to all line staff to help them advance step by step.
In practice, Molly feels she does not receive appropriate coaching and feedback from her immediate supervisor and project manager. She feels that they assume she knows more than she really does, simply because she is so good at figuring things out for herself.
Molly is fairly confident of her approaching yearly appraisal. When her supervisor decides to provide an advance heads-up, Molly believes she will receive supportive feedback for her hard work. Instead it is barely mentioned. She feels her supervisor is telling her she is not conforming to expectations that she didn’t know existed.
“The perception around here,” says the supervisor, “is that you are a bit arrogant and feel you are smarter than everyone else. Your appraisals of others are more negative than we expect, and we worry this is an indication that you are not able to work well with others.”
Molly is not upset with her supervisor; she is actually relieved to hear this feedback before going in front of the whole committee. For that matter, she feels that this supervisor, who is new, is much better at communicating than the previous one. However, she now worries whether her work is considered substandard, rather than high-quality as she assumed. She has totally lost confidence in her own judgment.
What can Molly do now?
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Jennifer Joyce responds:
In this scenario, it may be easy to find problems with how Molly’s supervisor and the appraisal committee are providing feedback. The feedback doesn’t appear to have a strengths-based approach or include positive feedback. It is entirely negative. The information is not specific and full of judgment (arrogance) and assumptions (Molly thinks she’s smarter than us). And it sounds like there may be issues around Molly receiving the direction and guidance she needs to do a good job on tasks with which she is not familiar. Finally, Molly is blind-sided by the information as she is expecting a glowing evaluation.
Nonetheless, making a case for “poor Molly” would take Molly down the path to powerlessness. Handled well, the situation could prove to be a gold mine for developing interpersonal skills, building more trusting relationships, and gaining new self-awareness about blind spots that have been undermining her success at work. In order to turn this situation into a positive career win, Molly should focus on three things: Self-management, “be in the question,” and “uncollapse” the issues of personal effectiveness from quality of work.
[to be continued in the next post]
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Jennifer Joyce, cofounder of LeadershipSmarts.com, is a leadership development consultant and coach. She specializes in diversity, continuous quality Improvement, team effectiveness, change leadership, strategic planning, meeting design and facilitation, leadership development and executive coaching. For more information, see www.leadershipsmarts.com
Carole Marmell, LMSW-IPR, C-SWHC, is a hospice social worker.
In the previous post, we met Tracy who is having a hard time getting along with Sasha. As Tracy complained to her partner, “how am I supposed to work on a charity event with someone who has nothing to say and has such a superior attitude?”
The response today is by Sandra Lopez, a licensed clinical social worker and consultant.
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Tracy’s scenario is just so typical of what any one of us might encounter. Clearly as she shares her feelings with her partner, we can see that Tracy has become frustrated, stressed, and is even experiencing some sense of helplessness in knowing how to make the situation better. Like many of us in these kinds of predicaments, she has formed negative assumptions about her co-worker. Given the current status of her relationship with Sasha, she raises a good question in wondering how she will survive the stress of working on this charity event.
How do we work through these challenging interpersonal conflicts when they happen? Tracy can relieve a great deal of her stress in this working relationship by consciously using herself to more effectively manage the situation.
I want Tracy to know that there is hope for improving her relationship with Sasha. I want to first invite her to sit, talk, and share what she’s feeling without any judgment. It can be helpful to simply talk things out with someone you trust and who will listen attentively. Perhaps in Tracy’s exploration of thoughts and feelings, she might hit upon something that gives her insight into these circumstances. Once Tracy has had this opportunity, I want to suggest she turn up the volume on her self-awareness — she obviously is having a pretty serious reaction to Sasha.
Why is this Tracy? She has allowed Sasha’s behavior to influence how she acts and this can potentially undermine Tracy being herself.
She could benefit from identifying her emotions and understanding how her actions and words are being influenced by her reactions to Sasha. In our conversation with Tracy we can help her to see where things went wrong and even support her in getting the emotional attachments out of the way. It might be helpful for Tracy to talk about when did this first start and when did she first notice that she was having a reaction to Sasha. This step is all about helping Tracy to stop and to take stock in what is happening in these interactions with Sasha. Having had similar experiences myself, I know that once we go into a place of being triggered by these emotions, it is so easy to lose sight of the real issues.
I want Tracy to see that she is making assumptions about Sasha that may be inaccurate. She thinks Sasha has a superior attitude and that she believes she is better because she is on the executive team. Do we know this to be true? Or, is this more about Tracy’s perception of Sasha?
Tracy also is beginning to participate in a detrimental behavior by aligning with another employee in making disparaging remarks about Sasha. Comments about Sasha having 9 cats and no husband are demeaning and can hurt the relationship building process.
I want Tracy to put herself into Sasha’s shoes. What is it like to be the VP’s Top assistant at the corporation? What about Sasha’s part in the charity event? She seems invested in the event as she volunteered to help. Could there be other reasons why she is not engaging with Tracy? Could she be shy or introverted? Could she be intimidated by Tracy’s outgoing personality? Does she feel pressure to project a serious demeanor at work because she fears she might lose her job?
We really don’t know, do we? If we make an effort to understand the other person, it can prevent us from making those inaccurate assumptions, and ultimately free us from some of the frustration and stress.
Two last points I want Tracy to consider. First, it is far more productive for her to focus on identifying her part in the poor interactions with Sasha as opposed to blaming Sasha for everything and viewing herself (Tracy) as the victim. It takes sincere reflections to realize that when we react we often aren’t thinking clearly in that moment—we are all about “feeling” and “reacting”.
Although many of us have been raised in having the good guy bad-guy mentality, we don’t have to view it this way. It takes courage to be willing to look at one’s contributions into a nasty situation. If we can remind ourselves that it takes two to “dance” in a relationship, we can move towards some beginning sense of understanding of the other person.
So when we put ourselves into Sasha’s shoes, we might wonder what is it like for her to be the VP’s top assistant at XYZ Corporation. How does she perceive her role in the planning of the charity event? Is her office behavior more about being shy and introverted? Does she have difficulty in creating work friendships?
All of these questions at least invite Tracy to consider that Sasha may have certain reasons for her behavior. It is obvious that Sasha must have strengths as she is the top assistant. Hopefully such an exploration will allow Tracy to let go of some of her reactions towards Sasha and to begin to see other possibilities.
Through self-awareness, thoughtful exploration, stretching to understand Sasha’s perspective and exploring her contributions, Tracy will have a good jump start for the road back to rebuilding the relationship with Sasha. With a commitment to this process, I am hopeful that Tracy will be able to effectively work with Sasha on the upcoming charity event — and who knows? — these two may even develop a far better working relationship.
Bio: Sandra A. Lopez is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with a clinical and consulting practice in the Houston area. She also serves as Clinical Associate Professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work.
Reference: “Conscious Use of Self”, Reframing Change, Chapter 6.
Tracy’s scenario is just so typical of what any one of us might encounter. Clearly as she shares her feelings with her partner, we can see that Tracy has become frustrated, stressed, and is even experiencing some sense of helplessness in knowing how to make the situation better. Like many of us in these kinds of predicaments, she has formed negative assumptions about her co-worker. Given the current status of her relationship with Sasha, she raises a good question in wondering how she will survive the stress of working on this charity event.
How do we work through these challenging interpersonal conflicts when they happen? Tracy can relieve a great deal of her stress in this working relationship by consciously using herself to more effectively manage the situation.
I want Tracy to know that there is hope for improving her relationship with Sasha. I want to first invite her to sit, talk, and share what she’s feeling without any judgment. It can be helpful to simply talk things out with someone you trust and who will listen attentively. Perhaps in Tracy’s exploration of thoughts and feelings, she might hit upon something that gives her insight into these circumstances. Once Tracy has had this opportunity, I want to suggest she turn up the volume on her self-awareness — she obviously is having a pretty serious reaction to Sasha.
Why is this Tracy? She has allowed Sasha’s behavior to influence how she acts and this can potentially undermine Tracy being herself.
She could benefit from identifying her emotions and understanding how her actions and words are being influenced by her reactions to Sasha. In our conversation with Tracy we can help her to see where things went wrong and even support her in getting the emotional attachments out of the way. It might be helpful for Tracy to talk about when did this first start and when did she first notice that she was having a reaction to Sasha. This step is all about helping Tracy to stop and to take stock in what is happening in these interactions with Sasha. Having had similar experiences myself, I know that once we go into a place of being triggered by these emotions, it is so easy to lose sight of the real issues.
I want Tracy to see that she is making assumptions about Sasha that may be inaccurate. She thinks Sasha has a superior attitude and that she believes she is better because she is on the executive team. Do we know this to be true? Or, is this more about Tracy’s perception of Sasha?
Tracy also is beginning to participate in a detrimental behavior by aligning with another employee in making disparaging remarks about Sasha. Comments about Sasha having 9 cats and no husband are demeaning and can hurt the relationship building process.
I want Tracy to put herself into Sasha’s shoes. What is it like to be the VP’s Top assistant at XYZ Corporation? What about Sasha’s part in the charity event? She seems invested in the event as she volunteered to help. Could there be other reasons why she is not engaging with Tracy? Could she be shy or introverted? Could she be intimidated by Tracy’s outgoing personality? Does she feel pressure to project a serious demeanor at work because she fears she might lose her job? We really don’t know, do we? If we make an effort to understand the other person, it can prevent us from making those inaccurate assumptions, and ultimately free us from some of the frustration and stress.
Two last points I want Tracy to consider. First, it is far more productive for her to focus on identifying her part in the poor interactions with Sasha as opposed to blaming Sasha for everything and viewing herself (Tracy) as the victim. It takes sincere reflections to realize that when we react we often aren’t thinking clearly in that moment—we are all about “feeling” and “reacting”.
Although many of us have been raised in having the good guy bad-guy mentality, we don’t have to view it this way. It takes courage to be willing to look at one’s contributions into a nasty situation. If we can remind ourselves that it takes two to “dance” in a relationship, we can move towards some beginning sense of understanding of the other person.
So when we put ourselves into Sasha’s shoes, we might wonder what is it like for her to be the VP’s top assistant at XYZ Corporation. How does she perceive her role in the planning of the charity event? Is her office behavior more about being shy and introverted? Does she have difficulty in creating work friendships?
All of these questions at least invite Tracy to consider that Sasha may have certain reasons for her behavior. It is obvious that Sasha must have strengths as she is the top assistant. Hopefully such an exploration will allow Tracy to let go of some of her reactions towards Sasha and to begin to see other possibilities.
Through self-awareness, thoughtful exploration, stretching to understand Sasha’s perspective and exploring her contributions, Tracy will have a good jump start for the road back to rebuilding the relationship with Sasha. With a commitment to this process, I am hopeful that Tracy will be able to effectively work with Sasha on the upcoming charity event — and who knows? — these two may even develop a far better working relationship.
Bio: Sandra A. Lopez is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with a clinical and consulting practice in the Houston area. She also serves as Clinical Associate Professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work.
In the previous blog entry, I listed advantages of reaching out to others about our private troubles, despite our fears of exposure and shame. Suppose you know intellectually that reaching out is best for you, but you just can’t muster the willpower to do so. You feel scared of being negative judged or humiliated. As a matter of fact, you feel humiliated just having the problem or thinking you can’t handle it alone. Read the rest of this entry
When is it okay for people talk about their problems?
Most people say they don’t want to talk about their personal problems because they are too private. Some people put talking about *any* problem with anyone at any time off limits. They endure their troubles alone. Others will talk only with a very few trusted friends and family members, keeping everyone else at bay.
Then there’s the common admonition about not being one’s personal problems to the job, so that talking about difficulties in doing one’s job or even undue stress at home is verboten. The assumption is that we are supposed to already have the answers or be able to handle our jobs or take care of ourselves without anyone’s help.
Is that true? Can we handle it all without help? Read the rest of this entry
Preface: Workplace Undercover is a regular feature of this blog. The scenario below was written by Eillen Bui, our research associate. Responding to this scenario is Stephanie Foy, Project Manager for Leading Consciously and Principal of Foy and Associates.
To quickly review Part A : Jeff, a manager, was hard time discussing Kathy’s performance with her during her annual review. So far, Stephanie has made two recommendations: encourage everyone to take a deep breath to diffuse anxiety and increase openness and receptivity, and assume a strength-focused approach, identifying what you appreciate and agree with.
Let’s continue with Stephanie’s recommendations on what Jeff might do next: Read the rest of this entry
Preface: Workplace Undercover is a regular feature of this blog. The scenario below was written by Eillen Bui, our research associate. Responding to this scenario is Stephanie Foy, Project Manager for Leading Consciously and Principal of Foy and Associates.
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The scenario: Kathy was running a little late for her first annual review. She hurriedly pushed the door open to the meeting room and smiled apologetically to her manager.
“Sorry I’m late. I was helping a customer pick out a winter jacket.”
Although somewhat annoyed, Jeff spoke up and repeated the company’s mantra, “Customers always come first.”
Jeff cleared his throat and started off, “This is your first review. I’d like to hear from you: what do you think some of your strengths and weaknesses are and have you overcome any of those weaknesses?”
“If you look at my sales record, you will see that I am one of the salespersons with the highest number in sales. I also believe I’m great with communicating and helping people, so customers absolutely love me. I’m confident that I have the lead in customer satisfaction as well. Whenever I am not helping a customer, I’m always busy putting away the clothes customers have tried on,” Kathy replied.
Jeff looked at Kathy expectantly and when she didn’t say anything further, he asked, “Do you believe you have any weaknesses?”
“No,” Kathy quickly said. “I don’t believe I have any.”
“Well, I have looked at your sales for the whole year and it seems that you missed your sales quota quite a few times. And—”, Jeff continued. Kathy interjected, “I might not have met my quota a few months, but I more than made up for it in other months. Not every salesperson is going to have great sales every month. If you look at my total overall sales, I believe I’m one of the best salespersons at this company.”
“Kathy,” Jeff said calmly, “I have looked at your sales record and you are the one with the lowest sales. You also have a lot of customer complaints these past few months. It seems as though—”.
“But that’s impossible!” Kathy said in a high, screechy voice. “All the customers I have helped say I am very friendly and very helpful. I don’t understand why I would have any complaints. And I don’t believe I have the worst sales record. Janine is a much worse salesperson than I am and she’s been working here for almost three years. I hardly ever see her talking to a customer.”
Jeff took a deep breath. “Kathy, I was trying to explain to you what the customers said they loved about you. They did comment that you are always ready with a smile and very helpful. But you don’t listen to what they want. For example, if they asked you to help them find black slacks and a blouse for a cocktail party, you would come back with a red dress. Can you please explain why you would disregard customers’ requests?”
“Because I know what would look good on them and flatter their body type,” Kathy responded.
“Do you understand what the customers’ complaints are actually about? Do you think not heeding customers’ desires might be the cause for your low sales performance?” Jeff asked.
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Do you believe that Kathy felt attacked by Jeff? Was she already on the defensive as soon as she walked into the performance review? Do you think that Jeff powerfully utilized his listening skills and showed openness towards Kathy? How could Jeff have relayed his corrective feedback to Kathy more effectively?
When was a time when you gave or received corrective feedback and it worked for you? How did you feel at the time? What made it work?
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Today’s Response by Stephanie Foy of Leading Consciously. This is an unfortunate situation that happens all too often. Prior to the annual review, staff members may have gotten little if any feedback. Then, when the stakes are high, and people are naturally more anxious, they hear negative feedback for the first time. Such seemed to be the case with Kathy.It was evident that Jeff was caring and doing all he knew to do to get Kathy to hear his feedback. Let’s consider some approaches that would have made this go smoother.
1. Encourage everyone to take a deep breath.
When Kathy arrives late, it is clear she feels a bit uncertain and possibly defensive. Jeff does a good job of giving her positive reinforcement by telling her that customers had commented on her smile and helpfulness.
He could have also given her reassurance and said “Have a seat and take a deep breath, we may be starting a bit late, but we can manage the time”. The suggestion to breathe is helpful in any stressful situation. It calms us, slows the heart rate, and brings more oxygen to the brain which helps us think more clearly.
After the verbal suggestion, Jeff could model the actual behavior by intentionally taking a couple of deep breaths himself. This start would create a more receptive space for both of them for the conversation that was about to take place.
Intentionally taking deep breaths, the kind others hear, will give a subconscious message and most people will automatically begin to take a deep breath themselves. This is a tool that anyone can employ in any situation to help decrease stress and anxiety and increase openness and receptivity.
2. Focus on strengths
To begin the review, Jeff asked Kathy to talk about her strengths and her weaknesses and what she did to overcome them. Although he said “strengths,” in similar situations, especially when feeling a bit uncertain anyway as Kathy must have, many people’s minds will jump to the weaknesses. They begin to wonder, “Oh my, I wonder what they are going to tell me?” and to go into a defensive mode. This is what Kathy did.
Alternatively, Jeff might have been more strength-focused as discussed in Chapter 4 of Reframing Change. He could have told Kathy that the intention of the review was to help her be as successful as she could be at Company XYZ. This conveys a future-orientation and that he has positive expectations for her employment.
By saying “Let’s start with your strengths,” Jeff could have given her feedback about a couple of her strongest behaviors that he had in fact noticed and appreciated.
He could have said, “Kathy, I want to start by saying I have noticed that you are very dependable—you are always on time and ready for work. It is so important that we are ready to greet our customers when we first open and your dependability is something we count on.”
Jeff could then follow up by asking, “Now, Kathy tell me some of what you think your strengths are.”
Given the strength–based tone of the conversation, Kathy will feel less defensive and less need to overinflate her strengths. While she may not still have a realistic picture of her performance, she is more likely to be honest and receptive.
As she talks about her strengths, Jeff should give verbal and nonverbal agreement for those that he concurs with, saying “I agree” and nodding his head. When he disagreed, he could still demonstrate openness and inquiry and say something like, “I see that a little differently, but I can see why you might think that. Let’s discuss this more as we move along”.
Once Kathy has shared her strengths and believes she has been heard as evidenced by his responses, she will be in a better place to hear his corrective feedback on her performance.
To be continued in Part B
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Stephanie Foy is Principal of Foy & Associates and a consultant and coach, specializing in enhancing personal and organizational performance, growth and wellbeing. Stephanie is also the Project Manager for Leading Consciously.
Preface: Workplace Undercover will be a recurring segment of this blog, featuring a workplace scenario and a response by a guest consultant. The scenario below was written by Eillen Bui, our research associate. Mary Harlan of Harlan Consulting is guest consultant for this scenario.
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The scenario: Thomas just began working at XYZ Corporation and still had not met everyone who worked there. Today he decided to eat in the cafeteria instead of bringing his own lunch and sitting alone in his office. He spotted Michelle, someone that he had spoken to briefly the other day and decided to go over to say hi. Michelle was sitting with a group of her friends and they seemed to be in a deep conversation. As soon as he got near though, the group at the table suddenly became quiet and no one would even look up at him.
Thomas felt uncomfortable so he passed by the table without even acknowledging Michelle. At first he felt saddened by the fact that his new coworkers were being unfriendly to him but then he became angry. “Why are all Asian girls so stuck up and rude?” he thought. Read the rest of this entry
