How Good are You at Giving Feedback?

The skills of giving and receiving feedback are among the most important communication skills with yourself and in your personal and professional communications.  How good are you at giving feedback?

For most of my life I was not very good at giving feedback.  When people would actively request feedback from me I would hold back and not share my full truth because I didn’t want to hurt them. Can you relate with that?

I had many frames of reference when someone would ask me for my feedback and after I gave it to them as requested our relationship just wasn’t the same.   They would become passive aggressive or stonewall me and I could tell that my feedback had cut them even though it was well intended.  

And if you think about it, when are people the best at giving open and honest feedback… when they are angry!   Piss someone off and all of the sudden they will tell you exactly how they feel.

The problem with this is that when we give the feedback from a state of anger or frustration or some other unresourceful state the quality of the feedback tends to go down dramatically, and then the person receiving the feedback tends to receive the message that feedback hurts and is dangerous. 

And so even though feedback can be the most efficient fuel for accelerated growth we avoid giving it and receiving it.

When delivered properly and when received properly feedback is the rocket fuel for accelerated learning and evolution, so how can we give feedback more effectively?

Here are four tips to take your skills of giving feedback dramatically to the next level.

1.  Ask the person if they’re open to receiving feedback before giving it.

“Is it okay for me to give you some feedback right now?”.  When you ask that question be sure to use your NLP calibration skills to read their non-verbal communication because even if they say “yes” with their mouth their body might be communicating that they are not open and ready.   Before giving someone feedback make sure that they are truly open and in the right state, even if they are the one requesting it.

2. Get yourself into the right state for giving the feedback.

Are you in the right state to be giving feedback right now?  If not, use your NLP state elicitation skills to get yourself into the right state.   While feedback should be delivered as soon as possible to the performance, getting yourself into a good state for delivering feedback takes priority.   One of my best states is a state of being caring and supportive.  I am here to help this person to grow and I want to give them a gift of my truth that will allow them to become a better version of themselves.

3. Once you are in the right state let them know your intention behind the feedback.

For me, one of my highest intentions in delivering feedback is to help someone to learn, grow and/or to improve our relationship. If this your driving is to hurt them, to prove you are right and good, or any other impure/self-centered intention then you probably need to get yourself into a more resourceful state for the feedback to be delivered cleanly.

4. When giving feedback separate the person from their behavior

Never give the person feedback about the person themselves e.g. “You are X” but to their behavior, “I saw/heard you do X.”  One of the purposes of sharing our truth with someone else is in the hopes that they will implement the feedback and change their behavior.  When we give feedback to the behavior(s) vs. the person, it opens the space for ‘the person’ to grow.

Of course there is more to giving feedback beyond this, but I trust that you will implement these quick tips to take your skills of giving feedback to the next level.

The only way to build new skills is to put them into practice so would you like to practice these skills right away?  Here is an opportunity to give me feedback!  Feedback is a wonderful gift, and I openly welcome yours!

1. What is something I have done well to support you in your journey of growth in coaching, communication, NLP, Neuro-Semantic skills?
2. What is something I can do/offer to improve for you?  I received a comment on a social media post the other day regarding the sound quality of my videos and that same day I upgraded my microphone!  Anything that you give me is good!
3. What topics would you like to hear from me? All inputs are greatly welcomed!

If we all were able to give & receive effective feedback the world would be a more happy, honest, and self-actualizing place and I hope that this article has given you some tools for better speaking your truth to yourself and to others.

Leave your questions, comments and feedback here!