Don’t Shy Away From Giving Feedback — O.W.N. It

As originally appeared in FORBES

Giving feedback is stressful for most people. It can conjure up feelings of fear and trepidation, so it takes managerial courage. Many of my clients are apprehensive of their employees’ reactions, in the form of defensiveness, emotional outbursts or negativity. They don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings intentionally or feel awkward while giving feedback.

The question I ask them is, “How else can you develop your team if you do not provide honest feedback?”

The Feedback Dichotomy

You may naturally assume your team does not want to receive what I call redirecting or corrective feedback, but that is far from the case. I’ve yet to meet an employee who doesn’t know this feedback is critical for them to improve, develop further and take on additional challenges. However, although they desire feedback, they may not like it. For most people, receiving feedback is uncomfortable and awkward. This dichotomy between liking feedback and wanting feedback causes many of my clients to postpone these discussions.

In many organizations, feedback is reserved for the annual review, since this is positioned to benchmark the employee’s performance. This can make you further hesitate to give corrective feedback and guidance in the moment that would otherwise help your employees to continue to develop throughout the year.

For the employee, receiving feedback gets a bad name because so many leaders avoid regularly giving redirecting feedback — or any feedback, for that matter. When employees receive feedback at the annual review, they are often surprised about what they did incorrectly and baffled about why they had not received any indication prior.

The O.W.N. Formula

My proprietary O.W.N. Formula paves the way for you to provide targeted feedback and feel more at ease while doing so. When done in this manner, employees feel inspired to make the necessary shifts and appreciate the investment you make in them.

O: Observations

Describe the behavior you observe. Cite specific examples of the behavior you want them to either continue doing or to address and correct. When employees receive vague feedback, this leaves them questioning what or where they need to improve.

An example of vague feedback would be “You don’t speak up enough in meetings.” The employee does not have the necessary insight into what they need to change or how to change it. Is it during specific meetings you want them to speak up more? What does speaking up more look like for the employee? By giving examples, the employee can gain greater understanding of what behavior you are asking them to modify.

Instead try, “In yesterday’s team meeting, there was an opportunity for you to share your opinion on the strategy with the rest of the team. When I asked if anyone had any input on our strategy, you remained quiet and didn’t share your point of view.” This provides an opportunity for the employee to address why they did not speak up and share their concerns with you.

It is important to focus on the specific and observable behavior and not to make it personal. Avoid unconstructive statements such as, “You are so timid. Just yesterday you didn’t speak up in our team meeting.” This can cause the employee to become defensive and not internalize your feedback. Focus on what you observed, and avoid making it personal by associating labels to the behavior.

W: Why Is This Important?

Once you have shared examples of the behavior you want to address, describe why it is important for you to give this feedback in the first place. Include the impact this behavior has on you as the manager or on the team, morale, etc.

An example of this is, “When you don’t speak up, your colleagues assume you don’t have an opinion or knowledge on a topic. The impact of this is that members on the team don’t view you as knowledgeable about the market, and they may not seek your input, or they may discount your opinion in the future. Having your voice heard on our ongoing strategy will be critical to your success for you to gain buy-in, be seen as a trusted resource and fulfill your interest in taking on additional responsibilities.”

N: Next Steps

I have seen it time and time again where a manager gives feedback, but does not discuss the specific actions the employee can take, or behaviors they need to modify to address this feedback. If an employee already knew how to make a change, they would probably already be doing it. They need guidance on how to implement the change, which is often the step you left out of their feedback discussion.

Next steps might require you to be more direct. For example, if an employee is continually late for meetings, you will need them to agree they will not be late in the future. You might even suggest they allow more time between meetings to ensure they arrive on time.

Other times, you may brainstorm options for correcting the behavior and agree, together on the specific actions they will take. For example, you might ask, “What are some options for you to feel more comfortable speaking up more in our team meetings? What steps do you want to take based on these options?”

Just Do It

Feedback is critical for your team to self-correct, improve their performance, and experience a sense of accomplishment and growth. But you must give balanced feedback. Without this, your team will see you as overlooking all the positive effort they make and focusing only on when something goes astray. Don’t miss out on opportunities to recognize good behavior, superior performance and stellar accomplishments using the formula above. This formula works for reinforcing (positive) feedback as well as redirecting (corrective) feedback. You simply need to O.W.N. it!