Background

For many years, the Center for Creative Leadership has encouraged people to give feedback in the form of situation, behavior, and impact. Many leaders and managers have told us that other forms of feedback are also necessary, especially in performance reviews when the focus is on how well an organizational member has been doing and on setting goals for future behavior. It became clear to us, therefore, that impact feedback will be more useful to leaders and managers as a choice among options, with its own strategic and tactical strengths and weaknesses like the others. This realization led to the study of the performance review process and deliberation about the forms of feedback that play an important role in that process.