Good boss | How to give feedback that actually works

Delivering feedback is a strange beast; it’s utterly pointless if you’re just seeking to inflate the ego of the individual that you’re reviewing, and whilst telling them that they’re doing a perfect job when they aren’t may well make them feel good about themselves, it isn’t helping them deliver better results, and it’s not helping you to ensure that your staff are effective.

However, being blunt and delivering a torrent of corrections and things that they’re consistently doing wrong will only serve to create a disillusioned worker and deepen the void between manager and worker.

Even good leaders struggle to toe the line between offering feedback that’s truthful and gives key KPIs, and swinging to one or the other of the aforementioned extremes, yet it’s perfectly possible to truly give your employee a roadmap for success, whilst still maintaining a positive and productive relationship, and learning how to do so is absolutely critical.

Clearcompany research stated that 96% of employees want regular performance reviews, yet 32% of respondents told the study that they have to wait more than three months to secure a meeting with their manager even after requesting one. Confused communication from managers account for a massive 70% of the mistakes made in the workplace, whilst nearly half of all highly-engaged employees received feedback at least once a week. Therefore, the correlation between your willingness to truly dedicate time to your team for delivering feedback could be the difference between having an effective, productive and engaged workforce, and a disillusioned one.