Why I’m over “delivering feedback”
This post is a summary of my in-depth podcast episode, Coaching Beats Feedback:
Spotify
I’m not saying managers shouldn’t have growth conversations with employees. Not at all. Employees need our help to evolve in their careers. They need someone to help them move through their blind spots. Managers should regularly be engaging with employees and providing their perspective and highlighting growth opportunities. I just think we should call this something other than “feedback.”
Did you know that the word “feedback” was first used in 1919? This is the original definition: the return to the input of a part of the output of a machine, system or process. Does that start to explain my annoyance of that word?
Feedback is the word we use all the time in Corporate America to supposedly help our team members do better work.
Words have power.
The terms and the interactions we use matter, and I don’t like the one-sidedness of “delivering feedback.” It sounds robotic and detached. It sounds like I’m just over here watching my employees, waiting for them to fail, and then swooping in with my judgment of them.
I know there are great managers who still call this “delivering feedback” and who even say things like “feedback is a gift.” But those great managers - because they are so good - are missing the way this concept is turned around by managers who have a less human-centered approach. I believe when those managers think about “giving feedback,” they are doing exactly what I fear the term gives them permission to do: weigh in without context, without true coaching, without help, and to just pass judgment.
Is this a hill I want to die on? Yeah, I think it is. I’m going to hold firm in recommending we move to having “coaching conversations” or “growth conversations.” When you just give one-sided feedback, you aren’t really helping your team members solve future problems or understand what excellence looks like.
