Transcript
Hi there and welcome to Module 5 where we will cover why asking for feedback is so important and how to go about doing it.
Asking for feedback is perhaps the most effective way to get the feedback you need.
As we covered in Module 3 as it relates to using feedback, asking for feedback is an act of ownership – it’s you intentionally breaking what is in many places a business world norm of passively waiting for feedback – and going after it to get what you need.
We’ve mentioned Kobe Bryant throughout this course.
Kobe had Phil Jackson as a coach, one of the greatest basketball coaches in history.
Kobe certainly could have been a passive recipient of Coach Jackson’s feedback.
Indeed, I’m sure many who have played for Coach Jackson did just that.
But Kobe went to the next level.
He received feedback from Coach Jackson, but as we covered, it didn’t end there.
He also sought feedback from what he called GOAT Mountain, a group of six of the greatest living players.
In the academic literature on feedback, this type of behavior is referred to as “Feedback- Seeking-Behavior ,abbreviated as FSB.
You can think of feedback-seeking behavior as referring to how individuals seek feedback either by reading the actions of others to infer what it means – in other words, to get feedback purely through observation, or by explicitly asking others for feedback.
This concept came to prominence thanks to this classic paper in 1983 by Susan Ashford and LL Cummings.
This paper, to my understanding, was the first to really go deep in an exploration of what it means for feedback recipients in the workplace to play a major and proactive role, to truly be owners of their professional development.
This all leads to what they write here, that FSB is “proposed as an important component of the feedback process.” Earlier in the paper, the researchers first set the scene for why feedback is important.
They write: “The positive effect of feedback on performance has been an accepted psychological principle since at least the early 1950s.” Among the paper’s many insights on the importance of asking for feedback, and the paper does suggest that feedback receivers should ask for feedback more often, I want to bring our attention to a few particularly compelling passages.
The authors state that these arguments “suggest that it may benefit both individual and organizations to not only give subordinates more feedback” and recall here some of the research we covered in the giving feedback module about how many managers completely avoid giving constructive feedback at all “as the current literature suggests, but also to improve the use of inquiry as a FSB strategy.” In other words, to promote the use of asking for feedback as a strategic tool in the workplace.
They go on to say that such a promotion can best be achieved by attempting to reduce some of the risk and effort costs involved in this strategy.
In other words, the culture matters.
If there’s psychological safety it will be far easier for everybody in the organization to engage in feedback seeking behavior because the team or department or even the entire organization will see it as a proactive act of growth.
Managers, they say, can play a major role in manipulating the shared meaning of this act.
Rather than a sign of weakness and uncertainty, asking for feedback could come to represent a confident desire to understand one’s strengths and weaknesses.
Note how the authors specifically call out strengths here.
We’ve covered it throughout this course, but I can’t reiterate it enough.
Knowing your strengths is often just as and sometimes more important than understanding your weaknesses.
A great ballet dancer, for example, could not have become great if they spent most of their time trying to shore up their weakness in geometry.
Or, to get even more specific, they wouldn’t have been able to carve out their unique and differentiated strengths as a ballet dancer – perhaps their incredible ability to maintain posture and balance during dynamic pirouettes – if they spent most of their time trying to leap further.
If you’re interested in learning more about the importance of strengths, you might check out a book called Strengths-Based Leadership.
I’ll link to it in the description.
The authors of our paper on FSB here conclude with “opening up this channel of feedback will allow employees to obtain more accurate appraisals of their work at the times when such appraisals are most valuable.” Lastly, let’s look at one other passage from this paper. “The perspective presented here is also beneficial in that it more accurately reflects how individuals actually acquire and respond to feedback in their organizational lives.
In situations where no verbal feedback is being given, our perspective argues that the individual is processing environmental cues and is deriving feedback information from them.” In other words, even in environments where nobody is providing feedback, feedback still remains.
They continue with “second, it is probably accurate to conceive of the individual as having several goals in his or her organizational life beyond present performance, and that each of these goals may serve as the organizing function of FSB.” In other words, as a feedback receiver you would do well to ask for feedback on a range of topics – from specific feedback directly tied to the task you are currently working on to perhaps more general feedback around how you may need to develop to move within your company from a director to a Vice President.
Even if we move out of the 1980s and into the modern era, we still find research highlighting the powerful role of asking for feedback.
Consider this quote from a paper in 2022 titled Learning Leadership and Feedback Seeking Behavior: Leadership That Spurs Feedback Seeking. “Lifelong learning is crucial for professionals to continuously develop and update their knowledge and skills, and for organizations to create and sustain competitive advantage.
In this regard, feedback-seeking is a powerful vehicle to gain new knowledge and insights in one’s development and performance.” Okay, so let’s jump out of the research and into how to go about asking for feedback.
First, come at this with a pure intention.
What do I mean by that?
Well, you may have experienced someone who seeks your feedback not necessarily to learn but to quickly get your approval so they can move forward with a project.
That’s not really asking for feedback.
Or, similarly, some seek feedback as a way to appease someone or to perform humility.
In other words, it’s more about the performance of being perceived as a humble feedback seeker than it is about gaining new knowledge and insights.
So, to the extent possible, try to seek feedback genuinely and not with hidden motives.
Number two: ask your manager.
This seems simple enough but it doesn’t happen as often as it should.
And remember that you don’t need to wait until a quarterly performance review to do this, you might even start next week by saying to your manager “Hey.
I’ve been watching a course on feedback and since we’ve been working together for insert time period, I’d like to get your feedback on how I’m doing, maybe what you see as my strengths and areas for growth.” Number three, and this is especially true if you are a people manager, you should be regularly asking your team either via a survey, directly going individual by individual, or even going to the group after a project – if the latter you can pull everybody together after a project and ask how they think it went, what worked, and where you might have been able to do a better job as their leader.
When this works, and it often does, you will both be receiving great feedback and also modeling for your team what feedback-seeking behavior looks like.
Number four is about indirect feedback seeking.
Study those in your field or beyond who inspire you.
Maybe you see those folks shining on LinkedIn or you saw them wow an audience at an industry conference or you’ve been reading their blog for years.
Rather than merely be inspired, see them as a case study worth really digging into.
What qualities do they bring to the table that you admire?
What are their strengths?
And is there anything about their strengths that you may be able to learn from to improve your own strengths or weaknesses?
Number five is about establishing peer-to-peer relationships, either within your organization or beyond.
The research on peer-to-peer feedback is vast and it suggests that we can learn as much or more from meeting with a few peers than we can from meeting with with our manager.
If you’re a digital marketer in a large organization, for example, you might reach out to another digital marketer at your same level who works on a completely different part of the business – perhaps you set up a monthly one-to-one conversation to share insights with each other.
You might also join an organization in your skill domain.
This will connect you with a variety of peers who likely have a similar skill set but have learned to apply it across different sectors.
Again, this could be a great opportunity to get feedback.
And, lastly, although there are plenty of other ways, ask for feedback after you interview somewhere.
Although some on interview panels aren’t allowed to share their feedback, many are willing if you really push for it.
This type of feedback can be especially helpful because this interviewer likely knows the type of talent they need and has perhaps already interviewed many other folks.
Their feedback can help you see how you stack up in your field.
I’ve personally provided feedback to a few folks who I had great interviews with but who for various reasons didn’t fit what I was looking for.
On several occasions, these folks sent me a response about how my feedback meant the world to them and will help both with their development and in their future interviews.
Okay team, that concludes Module 5: Asking for Feedback.
I’ll see you over at our final module.