The power of feedback
“Feedback is a gift”
During a recent conversation with a close friend where we covered a range of sensitive areas, we eventually arrived at the crossroads of giving and receiving feedback in both personal and professional capacities. The key takeaway from the conversation was when my friend said, “feedback is a gift”.
It can sometimes seem that it is over used with the continuous requests to provide feedback for all manner of services from online shopping to tripadvisor experiences, but it doesn't diminish the value of it.
Whatever your vocation is in life and whoever you must interact with, gaining an understanding of how you come across, what you do, and how others perceive you can be some of the most valuable insights to learn from. Feedback can be both verbal and non-verbal. Non-verbal examples can include facial expressions such as raising an eyebrow to express surprise or folding arms which might suggest defensiveness.
Examples of feedback
As a business coach with the goal of helping others to improve or outperform it’s critical to know what is working for people as well as what isn’t. As one would expect there isn’t a one size fits all model that can be applied to coaching individuals, but the feedback from clients on what they learn from the sessions and how it helps them gives valuable insights as well as inspiration and motivation. The desire to improve in a professional capacity can be achieved by embedding a feedback loop into the process. It’s about as close as you can get to a virtuous circle!
To illustrate, here are three real life examples of feedback I have had from different people based on a theme of communication when answering the question “What have you learned from the sessions?”
“Valuable insight both personally and professional. The importance and self-awareness of my own (non) verbal communication. Try to find solutions in places you won't expect at first.”
“I am more aware of my communication style and how I am perceived as well as the style of others I work with. I need to adapt to suit the audience if I want to ensure the information is understood and mutually accepted. Things can move so fast at xxxxx but keeping a record of the key goals and revisiting this each month really does help me focus and also to see what we have achieved. I find this approach very helpful and have started to do the same with other areas of my work.”
“To be concise and go back to first principles”
Whilst some of the challenges may appear similar on face value the approaches taken, and consequential results will vary considerably between individuals.
Conclusion
In summary then the takeaway I want to leave you with is to think about how you can incorporate feedback into what you do as well as taking the time to pause and reflect on what it’s telling you. Knowing and increasing the understanding of a client and their requirements or needs and then understanding what works is as important as knowing what doesn’t. Knowing what can be improved on and developed further puts you in the fast lane for achieving excellence!
As my friend said “feedback is a gift” - the power comes from what you choose to do with the gift.
Acknowledgements
Thank you again Mr William Brown, previously SVP GCC at Software AG and Mr Steve Abrams, previously at Microsoft for their review
Author Erlend Asker
