Feedback 201
3 stories, why do we struggle to give feedback, what worked and what didn't
Hope break was good. Wishing you new experiences/adventures in 2023. Let’s go!
Today at a glance:
3 feedback-related stories. Odds are you experienced at least one of these
Importance of giving feedback or what happens if you don’t
Why do we struggle to give feedback
What worked and what didn’t
Reading that helped
3 stories. All are true and I bet you’ve had similar experiences.
Teammate A comes to you. They are at the brink with teammate B. A tells you that the entire working team isn’t happy with B and this week was the last straw. B didn’t do their one task and didn’t take responsibility for fucking up. You (or your HR if you are a larger team) ask A for all the feedback they’ve given to B to date. A hems and haws. There is nothing. If we start the conversation with B today - this will be the first time B will learn they are not doing well. Not good.
You reflect on the last year with your leadership team. One of the main learnings is that we should be giving more praise and more feedback. You do a training. You read a book together. You make a commitment to up the feedback game. 6 moths later at people review the same names come up as not having an impact and hurting culture. Not good.
Teammate B is on your team. B is not A+, but the rest of the team are some of the best you’ve ever worked with. You are moving. The energy on the team is infectious. B has a tendency to not check his work. Sometimes it feels like he mails it in. Each time you fix it to keep the momentum, but do not tell B why this hurt. Your priority is to keep things moving. B also has personal errands and they pile up. They also seem to be the kinds of errands and life events that must happen on weekdays. So B is now out large % of Thursdays or Fridays. Often B posts about this in team chat to give people heads up - because in your culture you over-communicate. You assume positive intent and keep going. Except now 2 things start to happen: (1) another person on the team starts to mail it in, (2) X% of the team is out on Fridays for all kinds of reasons. Bad habits metastasized. Not good.
Odds are you’ve been in these situations. I have and to my core I regret not doing more. The consequences of not giving feedback (tough love and praise) are large. So let me share what I’ve learned and if you have things you’ve learned or if you think I am off in any of this - please share. Let’s learn together!
Importance of giving feedback or what happens if you don’t
First, if we don’t give feedback - we are holding the team back from achieving true potential. Opportunity costs of a wrong hire are high. A bad fit at a startup can wreck havoc. If the person is senior - it hurts even more because they cost more and because they have leverage on the team. If the person is not just slacking, but hurting, meaning they are detracting from the work, making bad decisions, diluting the culture - the damage is 100x. Bad habits spread. Subpar performers bring everyone to their level and now we are swimming in glue. These costs are even higher on teams who treat everyone like an owner (a good thing). If a bad actor is trusted and empowered - the damage can be catastrophic.
Second, if we don’t give the feedback - we are hurting the individual. The person must know the truth. If the person is surprised by being let go for performance - leadership fucked up. I’ve made a lot of mistakes. Some cost millions (not exaggerating), but part of the reason why I was able to continue was because I was fortunate to have had teammates who called me out. People have blind spots. People often may not know how they are showing up or what impact their action (or inaction) is having on the team.
Another part of it is fit. Some things have an end. Despite all the conversations, the good intentions, finding another role on the team (90%+ a mistake) - it’s just not working. What if this is just not a fit? A good culture is pointed and not for everyone by design. There might be a culture that is a better fit for this person. Parting ways with a team can be a good thing. Getting laid off from D.E.Shaw seemed like a life-ending event to me, but I am now grateful to them for letting me go.
Who we build with is more important than what we are building.
Taking care of the the team and investing in people is a P0. Getting assholes and culture-detractors off the team is also a P0.
Does feedback always mean tough love? No
Tell people they are doing an amazing job. Do it often and do it in public. Make sure that they know why this specific thing was good and re-enforce your values. There are a ton of psych studies that show that receiving praise at work is rare, but it matters so much. Receiving praise from teammates and from managers is a high driver of morale. You get to celebrate the person, you get to let the team know what is A+ behavior, you get to also build a deeper relationship.
Building a company is hard. Building great culture is hard. Building a team where everyone is operating at the next level and loves it is hard. These things get harder as the team grows and as you hire. There is 100% chance that there will be recruiting mistakes. Knowing that hiring is hard and that mistakes are inevitable, one of the largest -EV moves a leader can make is to let a bad hire stay on the team.
It takes deliberate daily effort (and often sacrifice and pain) to hold a high bar. And so to build something great I do not see an easy path that skirts these conversations.
Evolution is painful by design, which is why having these difficult conversations in the moment is a must.
Why do we struggle to give feedback, specifically tough love?
We know we should. We read the books and the blogs. We reflect on it in leadership meetings and we still flop. Here are some of the most common reasons for why people tend to avoid these conversations:
I worry they will react poorly/not hear me and we get nothing out of this
I don’t have the time
I worry I will upset this person. I want to be liked
It is not my responsibility. Someone else is already handling this or should
I am not sure how to do it well
This is not in line with our “culture” where we insert_nice_words
I am still avoiding some of these conversations because of #1. #6 is common - especially in tech. It is a colossal mistake to use high-empathy caring culture as a shield to not have tough conversations. We should unpack each of these and consider the other side of that argument. What is the worst thing that may happen if we do go through with this conversation vs. what happens if we do not?
What would it take to get past these fears and act?
These are real problems. I don’t think we are going to unpack each one here. But I do think that the onus is on leadership to do the hard things. Shocking insight! I think that leadership should be obsessing over every aspect of the team and certainly over team dynamics. The job of leadership isn’t necessarily to be liked 24/7/365 by everyone. The job is to do the right thing for the people and the business. Sometimes it means having a tough thoughtful in-the-moment conversation.
What worked and what didn’t
Giving feedback worked. The end.
We could have ended the email here, but I wanted to share the 3 stories with you. Reflecting back on 10+ years in tech the #1 thing is to share. Give the love. Thank people. Tell them where they let you down or how they can do better. Do it thoughtfully, read the how advice (all the advice on feedback has the same patterns - it’s worth reading), but the #1 thing is to do it.
Do not delay. Think about the team and the other person. Be kind. Share.
For fun I searched in 3 different g-drives for <feedback> and/or <leadership> and/or <lt>. Search results brought up many docs. Despite the fact that these are different teams, with different business models, and different team dynamics - one common theme is feedback. We wished that we either gave more feedback sooner or we set a goal to be more deliberate about feedback in upcoming quarter.
The other part of this is the how behind feedback. What is a constructive way to share that something is going well (easier) or something is broken (harder)? I am going to skip the how part for 2 reasons: (1) it feels prescriptive and you get it, (2) there are good books on this, which I will link below.
Giving feedback often and not letting things fester will make the conversations 10x easier. Then we want to land in the top right quadrant and we are good.
Reading that helped
Radical Candor by Kim Scott. It’s one of the most well-known books on feedback. I read it in early Streamlabs days and found it useful.
Difficult conversations by Douglas Stone. You will find this useful in all aspects of life - from romantic relationships to work to having a conversation with your parents. My #1 takeaway from this book was the importance of empathy and perspective taking - really trying to understand and hear the other side. I read this book during Minecraft days.
Dare to lead by Brene Brown. Brown is also famous for this one. Friend recommended so I read and found parts of it useful.