CHAPTER 10

IMAGINE

WE’VE SHARED OUR COLLECTIVE experiences, advanced our thinking with compelling research, refined and enhanced our ideas, boiled it down, and bared all with the intention of helping you do good work and be your best self. We’ve made the case for our movement, explored the science behind it, and offered tangible tactics and models for a new brand of feedback— feedback that helps us thrive, improve, and grow while reducing the pain and resentment that too often results from old-school thinking and misguided practices. We’ve shown you how you can engage as a Seeker, a Receiver, and an Extender. We’ve given you tips, tricks, models, and guidelines. But now that we’ve laid it all out, we’ve got a confession to make: There’s something bigger going on here. Something bigger than just you.

Set aside today’s reality and dream with me for a moment. Imagine the impact we will have when we put our collective efforts into redefining feedback. Imagine the results when our shared energy is directed toward creating work environments fueled by positive connections. Imagine creating cultures in which feedback flourishes and our proven practices of seeking, receiving, and extending feedback are the accepted norm. Imagine a world where we feel safe being authentic and transparent about who we are, and just as open about the work we still need to do to be who we want to be. A world where we let go of the fear and embrace the help others offer us, and where our energy, time, and momentum are always oriented toward the future. Imagine.

We want to live in that world! We want it for our organization, for your organization, and for all the teams of people out there working to cure cancer, create new sources of energy, heal the sick, pave roads, cut hair, grill hamburgers, dream up new flavors of ice cream, and all the other things that make life worth living. It’s the experience we want our children to have as they enter the workplace, and our parents to have as they bid it a gradual farewell.

Clients often assure us that they want to build a culture of feedback for their people. But we are not so sure that they’re imagining it in the same way that we are. Do they really understand that we’re not just talking about turning up the volume on the old ideas and approaches? Do they understand that we are not merely advocating for putting our energy into more timely or complete review forms? Are they ready and willing to let go of control, labels, and centralized power?

So, as we wrap up, we want to remind you that our new version of feedback is defined as having the sole intention of helping. The movement will be led by Seekers, supported by thoughtful Extenders, and encouraged by open Receivers. It will flow across teams and people in a manner that is easy, genuine, and informal. It will feel new, and it will take us some time to get comfortable with it. It won’t be a linear path. It will succeed if and when we individually and collectively show up differently.

As our parting gift, we present some easy practices that your team can use to build feedback muscles and learn together. These ideas offer an easy starting place to open the door to opportunities for team and peer feedback. They provide a great way to practice feedback as we’ve defined it for our new world. Try them on, tweak them to fit, create some of your own, and let them help you move your team forward.

• End every meeting with an exercise that allows the attendees to reflect on the goodness of the meeting or the topic at hand. At PeopleFirm we call it “Bs & Cs” (benefits and concerns). One of my clients does “liked it, learned it, lacked it.” Or you can always fall back to the old tried and true plus/minus.

• Devote a few minutes during team meetings to expressing gratitude. Ask for the group to call out a “thank you” to others. Don’t force it, but encourage sharing.

• Launch a simple peer feedback process. It doesn’t have to be heavy; simple and light is best. “Feedback Fridays” are a fun way to start building muscle one day at a time.

• Welcome employees into talent reviews to share their aspirations and development wishes. At PeopleFirm we like to say, “Nothing about me without me.” Giving employees this opportunity to be direct recipients of feedback about their careers is a powerful means of reinforcing the principle that they need to lead the way in determining their own growth and advancement.

These ideas should help you get started. Marry them with the practices we’ve shared throughout this book. Just remember to keep it frequent and light; rich in gratitude, recognition, and positive feedback; and clear, factual, and bite-size. Focus all that on future growth and we’ll be well on our way to creating a world where feedback is no longer a dirty word.