As a manager, you have a responsibility to help your employees grow professionally and contribute their best efforts toward the team’s goals. This means creating a culture where employees are willing to accept criticism and make positive changes. Feel free to check out these employee feedback examples to help you navigate different situations you might face as a manager. Giving constructive negative feedback goes beyond a way to ease a blow.
Use these best practices the next time you want to give negative feedback but want to do so constructively.
Do it in Private
Leaders make a mistake when they bring up an employee’s failure to meet expectations in front their colleagues. You know how damaging public criticism can be for employee morale.
Even if they are positive comments, managers must only provide them to employees in private. Some people are uncomfortable being publicly praised and criticised.
Empathize
Both managers as well as employees are human beings that react strongly when they don’t achieve expectations.
Defensiveness may seem normal to an employee, but it is not. Leaders should not interpret defensiveness as defiance. They should instead consider how they themselves would react in the same situation.
Be direct
Effective employee feedback is direct with clear expectations and concrete examples that offer solutions.
Offer solutions
It is not possible to improve performance by giving vague directions, such as ‘You need to do more’ or ‘That’s just not enough’.
Managers can provide actionable feedback by referring back to past behavior or work, and giving examples of what could be improved.
This can be changed into “These types of tasks require more detail than what you have included here.” Let’s take a look at an example.
Don’t lecture
Most people do not like to be lectured. Feedback should be an open conversation where employees are free to share their opinions and experiences.
Managers can convert lectures into discussions by allowing employees to process information before moving forward. Asking them follow-ups or letting the employees offer growth ideas is one way to achieve this.
It can sometimes be difficult to provide negative feedback. However, it’s important to do so with a good attitude. Here are a few tips on how you can give negative feedback in an effective way:
- Be specific. Don’t generalize about someone else’s performance. When describing what should be improved, be specific. Give concrete examples of what was done or did not happen and how that affected the work.
- Focus on behavior and not personality. When giving negative comments, it is important to concentrate more on the behavior or actions of the person than their personality or characteristics. Be sure to state that you are criticizing the person’s actions, and not their personality.
- Context: Ensure that the person you are giving feedback to understands the context of your feedback. Explain to them the reasons why their behavior was problematic and how it affected their work or team as a whole.
- Offer solutions. Don’t just mention the problem; suggest ways to improve. Give specific advice about what they should do differently.
- Use positive language. Even if the feedback is negative, frame it in a positive way. Use language to motivate, not harshly criticize. It is important to make it clear you are giving feedback in order to improve performance.
- Listen carefully: Be sure to listen to what they have to say as a response to your feedback. Allow them to express their opinions and offer their own solutions. This will make them feel valued and appreciated, and could lead to a more productive discussion.
Remember that your goal is not to criticize or belittle someone, but to improve them. You can give negative criticism constructively by using positive language, being specific, focusing only on behavior, presenting context, offering solutions and focusing on specific behaviors.