No Pain Feedback

Do You Cringe When Someone Says: "I have some feedback for you....."?

You've probably heard lots of people go on about 'feedback'. And you probably dropped right off to sleep about two seconds in. I'm willing to bet that was because you didn't realise just how important feedback is. I'm telling you now, it's the least used, yet most effective tool available to you. And it's so easy when you know how. And it doesn't have to hurt.

The Worst Team

I was asked to work with a team that was really struggling. They were the worst in the whole building. Just imagine how you would feel if you were in that team and you were the worst person in the worst team. That was Mary. She was seriously unhappy.

What would you do in her place? Try really hard to increase your output? Or would you become disheartened and give up?

But, in less than a day after working with me, she had improved drastically.

In just one week the output of the whole team had increased by 25%. At the end of a month it had doubled. They were transformed into the best of all the teams. Other teams came to them to find out how they did it.

I ended up having to do a presentation to the whole company about what we did.

The Secret

Feedback. That's it.

You've probably heard all this rubbish about "Positive" and "Negative" feedback and you may even have come across the dreadful "Feedback Sandwich", but I can assure you, that's all a complete waste of time - and actually damaging.

The Truth

When you don't get the feedback you need, you can't improve. No matter how hard you try, you still don't do any better.

It's unbelievably frustrating. You keep trying different things, but nothing works because you don't know what it is that really makes the difference.

Having no feedback is like driving with a blindfold on. Getting the right feedback is having top of the range Sat Nav. It gives you the information you need so you can do what gets the results you need.

What Most People Just Don't Know

Research shows that, with the right feedback, you can improve your performance by 39%. In my experience, it's usually much more than that.

But, in spite of this, you probably aren't getting all the feedback you need in order to do your job as well as possible. You also may not be giving others the feedback they need to do their jobs as well as possible. It's more important than ever during these tough times to be doing your job well.

To make sure you are getting the feedback you need at work, ask yourself this question:

How would I know, by the end of today, that I was on plan in my work/this project/the task I am doing now and that it was going to be successful?

When you have answered that one, move on to:
How would I know, by the end of this week, that I was on plan in my work/this project/the task I am doing now and that it was going to be successful?

And then move the time further out so that you have systems set up to ensure you get this information when you need it.