Want to Give Effective Feedback? Here’s How

In any work environment, there will come a time that you will be expected to deliver feedback to another employee. Whether this is mandated by your agency, or something that you feel needs to happen, feedback is inevitable for any professional during their careers.

However, delivering effective feedback isn’t always easy, and there’s a lot that goes into it. So much of what makes feedback effective depends on how you go about delivering the message, and that in itself depends on the type of feedback you’re giving. There are three types of feedback, and chances are, you’ve encountered all of them at some point during your career. Depending on what you’re trying to accomplish when giving your feedback, you are either telling, training, or advising and mentoring another employee.

Now, if you aren’t properly prepared to adequately deliver your feedback, it can be difficult to do so without causing tensions of some sort. Employees could be overly-worried or unprepared for what you’re going to say, and it can cause some distrust between you. Because of this, it’s crucial to create an environment for effective feedback.

This means building trust and respect between you and other employees at your agency, whether they be more senior or junior to you. No one will respond well to feedback, of any kind, when it’s coming from someone they don’t trust or respect. In order to build these attributes between you and others, an investment of your time and energy must be made.

Trust isn’t developed overnight, and neither is respect. It really does take time, but it’s crucial that you show your coworkers and employees that developing these traits is important to you, so you can make it known that you’re dedicated to fostering a strong working relationship.

A great way to exhibit trust and respect is by giving feedback in a safe space. There are a lot of different possibilities for what constitutes a safe space, so take a look at the lesson to learn more about what you can do to ensure feedback is given in a confidential, secure manner.

Even with trust and respect, though, there are still necessary steps to take in order to make sure your feedback is being well-received. You also need to have high levels of engagement throughout your agency, at all times. Make sure that everyone feels comfortable engaging with each other, no matter what the situation, or if it is required or not.

Engagement works to build respect and trust, but those aren’t the only three ingredients for good feedback. Learn how all of these aspects are related, what else you need, and how you can do your part to ensure effective feedback is being delivered with GovLoop Academy’s New Course Now!