How Honest Are We?

I have been working with senior executives this month in the healthcare, telco, oil and gas sectors talking about feedback. Our conversations explored the challenge around candour. An executive shared with me his frustration around what might be termed one of his ‘rock star’ sales professionals who had lost a multi-million dollar account. During the course of my subsequent discussions with the sales executive, what was absolutely apparent was the reality that he had not had candid feedback about his behaviour and shortcomings that had led to the loss of the account. He was in denial and - according to him - it was simply a set of extraordinary circumstances that were beyond his control which had led to the loss.

This got me thinking……….

As leaders, just how honest are we? Especially when we are working with high potential talent, senior managers running large organisations and people we want to keep engaged, enthused and excited about coming to work? We all like to believe that we are honest in our approach, and yet how often do we hold back? What are we afraid of? I am struck by the misconception that candid feedback means only negative consequences – such as demotivation, demoralisation, turmoil within the team, significant emotional upset and ultimately – losing great people. I suspect this fear has arisen because the culture created around feedback has been so dire to date.

Leaders and managers who continually deliver outstanding results in difficult times are able to ignite their people around the cause, build strong relationships and get the balance of challenge and support right and are able to give honest, uncluttered, candid feedback. And their teams love it. In fact, they crave it. Kim Scott from FaceBook coined a phrase and an approach called ‘radical candour’ - which I love.

So, if we want to be more honest as leaders – which we need to be – if we are going to do more with less, manage the uncertainty, complexity and challenge of our times, then practical steps we can take now are: 

• Talk about the importance of high impact, candid feedback – regularly. Remember, what we talk about is what our teams will care about. If we care about feedback as part of a high performance culture, then we need to talk about it – and challenge our teams to be providing it regularly, as well as doing so ourselves. 
• Make the time to give high impact, candid feedback. Use simple models to structure our comments, avoid lengthy preamble, keep it short, allow the audience time to reflect, make sure it’s evidential (so it’s objective) and explore how the gap can be filled. 
• Give more feedback, appreciate progress and effort and always remain candid if the result isn’t yet where it needs to be. 
• Ensure we catch people doing things right; and use the same approach. A lazy, casual ‘great job!’ won’t cut it. 

Until next time…..