We are in the middle of a four-part series examining five essential elements of leadership development. So far, we’ve focused on the importance of leading yourself and leading the work. In this post, we will shift our attention to the time in the talent lifecycle when we, as leaders, are reflecting on the performance of the individuals on our teams.
Leading people is an essential aspect of leadership development. One foundational skill in leading people is providing productive feedback to help your team grow and improve. In order to do that, we need to build a culture of feedback by providing ongoing feedback—not waiting for the formalized times on the calendar—a mid-year check-in or annual review.
Our role as leaders in creating a culture of consistent, frequent feedback starts with our desire and ability to receive feedback. In this blog post, we will focus on mindsets that can help you grow your ability to receive feedback and provide a simple question to help you get the feedback you need.
Mindsets: Growth Mindset and Curiosity
Growth Mindset: Sometimes, when we receive feedback, we defend our position. To make a shift, we need to come with a growth mindset – I want to grow every day and take the feedback in that spirit:
I want to grow and get better
The person sharing the feedback wants to help me grow and get better
Curiosity: We may also tend to deny the feedback or to feel lousy about it. This is when curiosity is key! In order to stay curious:
Seek to understand
Ask questions that encourage the feedback giver to fully share their feedback
Make the feedback meaningful by asking questions to learn more and understand the feedback so you can accept it and take action to get better
Skillset: Practice
The best way to get better at receiving feedback is to practice! Continue to ask for feedback – it’s easiest to receive it when you ask for it. So how can you practically do that?
Sheila Heen, author of Thanks for the Feedback shared a tip for getting better about asking for feedback that really resonated with our team, and we share this with leaders in our workshops.
Instead of asking “Do you have any feedback for me?” which can feel like a really big question that someone needs to prepare to answer, ask...
“What’s one thing I can do differently next time to make X even better?”
Most of the time, people will have one thing to share, allowing you to get micro feedback in the moment that you can apply. This can exponentially grow your development because you are getting specific, meaningful feedback that you can use to support your development more often.
We are inviting you to make a feedback commitment today! Who can you ask for feedback from in the next week?
I will ask ___________ for feedback in the next week.
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