Hi friends,
This week as I alluded to in my last newsletter article, I’m going to be talking about feedback. The takeaways are based on the book Thanks for the Feedback by Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen, you might recognize the authors from their other book Difficult Conversations.
What I like about both of their books is while it is written in a very academic fashion, it is thorough in covering the topics. There’s a very structured approach to approaching both difficult conversations and getting feedback, which makes it feel well researched though in both cases, it’s hard to keep your head straight and remember the approach when you get feedback like you’re not a good employee or you’re a bad friend.
For this newsletter, let’s talk about some of the things I learned about receiving feedback.
The three triggers
Much like Difficult Conversations, there are three ‘areas’ to watch out for when receiving feedback.
Truth trigger (that’s where the ‘truth’ may not be objective)
Relationship trigger (that’s where the relationship you have with the other person influences the feedback received)
Identity trigger (that’s where the feedback being received conflicts with what you believe about yourself)
We take a look at the Truth trigger and what that means.
Get all the data and information on the table.
Many times when you get feedback (and I’m using one on one scenarios as an example, but it can apply to group settings as well), you’re not seeing all the data the other person is using to come to a conclusion. Your boss thinks you aren’t a hard worker because they see you leave early every day, but they don’t see that you’ve been working late at night to more than make up the hours.
Sample questions to help you get all the data out:
[After explaining what you are seeing] What are you seeing that I’m not seeing?
I’m not understanding how you are coming to that conclusion. Can you tell me what data you are using to make that conclusion?
Let’s lay out everything that we’re seeing. I’ll go first and you can fill in what you are seeing.
Understand everyone’s interpretations of the data
Even if everyone is working off the same information, it doesn’t mean that people will see things the same way as you do. My neighbour see a pond just outside their backyard and thinks “what a great view”. I see a pond outside my backyard and think “I dread mosquitos”.
The story I'm telling myself is [x]. How do you see things?
Based on the data we have, this is what I'm concluding. Do you see it the same way? What am I missing or not seeing?
Everyone has blind spots
Although we think we may be doing the best we can, we sometimes get feedback that no we aren't doing that well. It's that surprising year end performance review from our manager. It's the feedback from our partner about not spending enough time with our children.
We have thoughts and feelings we know. We have intentions we understand. We act in certain ways, but that's where the gap is because we don't see how all of our behavior impacts others.
We think we're a good partner because we do everything our partner asks but your partner sees you rolling your eyes at every request or complaining under your breath each time.
Two things you can do here:
Ask for specific feedback on what they see that you aren't. What is it about what you do that isn't sitting right with them?
Be open about your thoughts and feelings and intentions and then ask how you can change your behavior to get the impact you want.
Relationship Triggers
Again, this is where because of the relationship you have with the person giving you feedback, it influences how you receive the feedback. This is most obvious when it comes with your partner who may know more about you than others do. When they give you feedback, it seems to hurt more. Or another positive example of this is when you receive feedback from your best friend where because they are your friend, you don’t get triggered if you had received the same feedback from a partner.
Avoiding switchtracking
One thing that tends to occur when you get feedback from someone you have a close relationship with is you tend to switch tracks. Think of your feedback like a train. You give the feedback and then that one train becomes two trains and then goes on different tracks. For example, the authors talk about a scenario from Lucky Louie where Louie brings his wife roses. His wife’s reaction is she doesn’t like roses whereas Louie feels like she’s not being grateful about the fact that he went to get roses in the first place. Each of them go into their own ‘track’ of feedback: his wife talks about how she doesn’t like roses and how Louie doesn’t listen to her since she’s told him many times she doesn’t like roses; Louie talks about how his wife is ungrateful and even if she doesn’t like roses, she should at least thank him for the gesture.
The problem with switchtracking as you may have noticed is that you and the other person are talking about two different topics and it’s difficult to resolve one topic when the other person is hung up on another.
Avoiding switchtracking isn’t easy, but it requires taking a step back to examine what is going on. Are there multiple issues being discussed? And if so, the solution is to call out the different issues and tackle one at a time.
In the scenario above with Louie and his wife, let’s say he gives his wife roses and his wife comes back with “why did you get me roses? I told you I don’t like roses.” If Louie takes a step back, he can see there are different issues (and in this and real-life scenarios, there’s often a deeper issue that’s not directly being addressed). Louie can pause and identify the different issues.
“Honey, I noticed there are a couple things here we should talk about. One is that I gave you roses and you didn’t show appreciation for my effort despite you not liking roses. The second is I’m hearing you don’t think I listen to you because I forgot you don’t like roses. Let’s talk about me not listening to you first.”
Generally, you’ll want to tackle either the issue that triggers you emotionally the most OR the other person’s feedback because it’ll help put you in a better position to then address your feedback to the other person.
Taking three steps back
Issues occur not because of the other person, but because that person is that way and you are this way and you both are interacting. It’s the intersection between you and the other person that is causing the issue. For example, if your friend only speaks Swedish and you only speak English, there aren’t any issues, until you and your friend try to communicate.
The point here is that when you think something is the other person’s fault and they have to change, they sometimes see it the opposite way (it’s all your fault and to solve the problem, you need to change). In other words, you both contribute to the problem.
One of the ideas from Difficult Conversations is part of what makes conversations difficult is one person (or both) go into a conversation giving judgment and seeking out who to blame - and if you go into a conversation looking to blame the other person, they’re going to get defensive or push back and you’re not going to get anywhere. It’s the same with feedback.
What three steps do you need to take?
Step 1 back: You vs. Me intersections. Yes, the other person might be doing something that is bothering you, but what are you contributing to the problem? If your daughter comes home past curfew, were you clear with your expectations? Was it because there was an emergency or situation your daughter had to figure out and she couldn’t reach you?
Step 2 back: Role clashes. Sometimes, it’s you and the person’s role that is clashing. Getting feedback from a coworker feels VERY different from getting feedback from a manager even if the same feedback is provided. Why? Because in the second situation, there is a power dynamic from your role and your manager’s. How might you and the other person’s role affect the feedback given?
Step 3 back: The big picture. This requires you taking a step back from you and the other person. Who are the other players in this? What is the timing of this? Politics? Decisions being made? You see your coworker gets injured at work while operating heavy machinery so you focus on your injured coworker - but what if it’s because of everybody working overtime because there isn’t enough staff? Or maintenance policies for the machines?
Next week, I cover the Identity Trigger and will talk about a new year-end process I’m trying out.