Stop Giving Feedback - Jenni Jepsen at FlowCon France 2019

[00:00:01] Good morning. Bonjour. Um, a big thank you to our sponsors who have made it possible for us to be here. Um, so I want to do a little shout out for the sponsors right now. I am Jenny Epson. Uh, I work for a company called Go Agile in Denmark. And my my job is to help leaders create spaces where people do their best thinking. Um, I happen to believe that agile ways of working is one way of doing that. Uh, pragmatic agile, that is. And, um, but in the work that I'm doing, I'm combining neuroscience. I took a study in neuroscience, neuroleadership, um, along with intent-based leadership. So, how our brains work inform everything that that, um, that I'm doing in the work that we're doing. So stop giving feedback.
[00:01:03] Yep. Just stop. Feedback, giving feedback.
[00:01:10] Unsolicited feedback doesn't work. So if we don't actually want the feedback, it's a complete waste of time. Think about the millions and millions, maybe it's even in the billions of euro that is spent every year around the world in training programs around how to give good feedback.
[00:01:34] It's a total waste. We're solving for the wrong problem. We need to solve for asking for feedback. Because what the research shows is that when we ask for feedback, we are in control of that feedback. We actually want it. And then it can be useful. But giving feedback all by itself, total waste, complete waste.
[00:02:00] So asking for feedback is the is the problem that we want to solve. How do we encourage people to ask for feedback?
[00:02:11] Yes.
[00:02:16] The environment for feedback has to be there in order for us to want it. Accuracy of the feedback, credibility of the source, the person who's giving us feedback. The environment needs to support us asking for feedback often. So there's a lot of things in the environment that we can do as leaders at every level in the organization to encourage people to ask for feedback. And we know that when, when we do that, when we get that feedback that we actually want, it sparks creativity. There's quite a lot of research around this. This is how we get to innovation.
[00:02:55] We learn from each other, different perspectives. And that is the idea here around asking for feedback. So what, before I do that, um, what I'm going to talk about today is, um, what gets in the way of giving and getting good feedback? What are the, the beliefs that we think are true about feedback but actually are not? And then what can we actually do to create an environment where people are asking for feedback? So that the feedback is useful.
[00:03:30] All right. So, I want to turn this over to you a little bit here as well. Think about your best or maybe your worst experience giving or, uh, or getting feedback. So find somebody to around you to talk with. I'm going to give you a couple minutes to talk about this. Your best or worst experiences with feedback. What made it good or what made it not so good? And what could have made it better?
[00:04:06] All right, so find somebody to talk with, best and worst experiences around feedback.
[00:06:37] All right. I really hate to stop you when there's good conversation going. Um, would someone like to share? Would someone like to share, either a best or a worst experience with feedback?
[00:06:57] Anybody brave?
[00:07:01] How about a best experience?
[00:07:05] What makes feedback good?
[00:07:08] Based on your experience. Have have you had a best experience with feedback?
[00:07:14] Ah.
[00:07:17] A bad experience for me is the sandwich feedback.
[00:07:21] Say again.
[00:07:22] The the bad experience for me is the sandwich feedback.
[00:07:25] The sandwich feedback. Yes. Do you want to say more about the sandwich?
[00:07:32] Um, I'm waiting for the ham, and I'm only waiting for the ham, which is the bad experience. And it's in between the bread which is an illusion of compliment for the the ham to go through.
[00:07:49] Yes. Yeah. I hate that feedback sandwich, too. It's like, yeah, okay, just quit with the buns, let's go straight to the meat, right? Yeah. Yeah. Other experiences, anybody want to share?
[00:08:04] Good or bad?
[00:08:08] Have the feedback that you've received, has it been useful for you?
[00:08:14] Show your hands. In general, feedback, useful?
[00:08:19] That's pretty good. Yes. Okay. You're doing the right things, I have a feeling. Okay. All right. So, what we know from the research is that, um, uh, in order to really get to high performance, we want to have at least weekly feedback. So again, the the one time per year, maybe it's the 360 feedback performance review, total waste, total waste. For many reasons.
[00:08:52] You're getting feedback over a year-long period, and you're missing all the subtleties of all the things that you've done during the year, so it focuses on things that that maybe are not so valuable for you.
[00:09:06] It also may come from people that you don't trust.
[00:09:10] And it's probably sitting in your boss's office where you're just waiting, maybe for the feedback sandwich, for example. So fewer than 20% of people actually receive weekly feedback, and of those 20%, only 27% find it useful.
[00:09:32] The rest of the feedback has little or no effect, and in some cases makes the situation worse.
[00:09:41] That's a that's a big issue in organizations. So what what can we do? What gets in the way? What happens?
[00:09:50] With feedback, it activates our amygdala. It puts us into a threat state. The amygdala is where our fight, flight or freeze is. And in fact, scientists have shown just the phrase, can I give you some feedback, lights up the amygdala like Las Vegas at night. So, it's just like, oh yeah, don't really want any of your feedback.
[00:10:18] It makes us put up our defenses. It takes a lot of cognitive control to open up yourself for that potential threat, if you will. It's dangerous for the brain. And the opposite is true for the feedback giver. Interestingly enough. We think we're being really helpful. I'm pointing out your mistakes, I'm giving you the opportunity to get better. That releases dopamine in my brain, it increases my status.
[00:10:50] So there's a lot to get over here. The, um, the next thing is called egocentric discounting. So, um, just recently I was on Airbnb looking for a place to stay, and I was looking at the reviews at one of the houses. And somebody had written this not so nice review, something about that the host wasn't very friendly and, um, the parking situation wasn't so good and, oh by the way, they forgot to put towels in the bathroom. And rather than, um, just saying thank you for your feedback or maybe not responding at all, the host basically said, yeah, but.
[00:11:37] And went on to say, well, all our other guests think this place is wonderful. So you're basically stupid.
[00:11:47] Egocentric discounting is when we have an opinion of ourselves and then we get the feedback, and there's a gap there between what we think of how we are and the feedback that we're giving, or getting rather. And in instead of taking it in, what we do is discount that feedback totally. We just say, hey, that's not, that's not true.
[00:12:11] Um, I've learned the hard way, so balancing being a consultant with understanding that we should not give feedback to people who don't actually want it, is not always an easy balance. Um, and I was working with an executive management team, and the the team was having a few issues with their boss. And none of them were willing or brave enough, I don't know exactly, um, to actually confront the boss about his behavior. And so they said, Jenny, you need to give him this feedback. I was like, oh, I know that that's probably not the right thing to do. I need to get his trust first before I can just sort of jump in and give feedback. And they said, no, no, no, no, you have to. We have to put an end to this. You need to give him this feedback. And I thought, okay, I'm the consultant, this is what I'm paid to do, is basically point out the the crap, and, um, hey, if he fires me, he fires me, that's how it is. It's my duty as a consultant. So, um, I, I said to him, uh Robert, you know, are are you, would you be interested in in some feedback on how the meeting went?
[00:13:30] And he reluctantly said, uh, yeah. Okay. So I proceeded to point out the things that I observed. So I was very careful to say my observations, this is what I observed in the meeting, that, um, when someone spoke, you jumped in and cut them off so they weren't allowed to finish their thoughts. That you disagreed and I think I had the statistics how how many times you disagreed with with what the executive team was talking about. So I had very sort of tangible, observable stuff, physical evidence.
[00:14:08] And then I said, so this is how I interpret that. That, um, command and control, you're not giving room for people. And, uh, here are some things that you can do, here are some ideas.
[00:14:24] And he said to me, well, actually, I think making people a little afraid is useful.
[00:14:34] I thought, oh, okay.
[00:14:37] Uh, and I can tell you since then I've been banished from all of those meetings. So, there's egocentric discounting in in motion. Um, yeah, so I don't advise doing that. Anyway, I've learned the hard way. Consultant, ask for feedback, we have to do that. All right. Okay. So then there's these beliefs that we have about feedback that actually are not true. And the first one is that we need other people to tell us where we should improve. So,
[00:15:13] I can't tell you how many people have given me feedback about how I need to become more patient.
[00:15:20] That's very specific and helpful, right?
[00:15:24] Um, I already know this about myself.
[00:15:28] I know where my faults are.
[00:15:32] I don't need anybody else to point them out to me.
[00:15:36] It's not helpful. And the research actually shows that we are incredibly bad raters of other people. So if I think somebody is really good or really bad, I'm seeing it through my own experiences, my own lens in my brain, my own perspectives. I could be wrong.
[00:16:01] Um, and this has actually changed how I give feedback. When people ask for it, I say, hey, this is my experience. I could be wrong. And that helps reduce the threat that people feel in receiving feedback. So thinking that we need someone else to tell us where we should improve, that's crap. We already know. We already know this. So it's not so helpful.
[00:16:27] The next is that we need others to teach us the skills that we're missing.
[00:16:35] This is also false. In fact, having people point out our gaps puts us into a a away state, a threat state where we're trying to protect ourselves. And when we're in that away state, that attitude of, oh, this could be dangerous, I need to protect myself, what happens is the prefrontal cortex, the rational thinking part of the brain, actually closes down, and our amygdala and the rest of the limbic system activates to protect us. Not exactly the best environment for learning. So what we need to do in order to have this environment for learning is to point out the things that we're already good at. Because what the science shows is the best way to learn is to build on the things that we're already good at. Where we can recognize what those things are and reinforce them, and then help other people to refine those things. And what we know is that when we put positive attention to something that that we did well, and then we were able to reinforce that by, okay, how can we take it further? How can we learn from this? How can we do this in a different situation? What happens is our in our brains is that we get a release of dopamine. So the reward centers in our brain, the pleasure centers in our brain are activated. When we can see that, ah, I can build on the things that I'm already good at and learn from there. We build stronger connections in the brain. It's just much easier to improve by building on the things that we're already good at.
[00:18:26] Okay.
[00:18:28] The third one is that excellence is sort of one size fits all. So, here's a little quiz. Who is the best painter in the world, living or dead? Just shout it out.
[00:18:49] Hey, we're in France, right?
[00:18:52] Da Vinci. Yeah, who else?
[00:18:58] Dali.
[00:19:00] Okay, how come you don't agree?
[00:19:03] How come you don't agree? You know, do we hold up Monet here and we say to Picasso, you know, Picasso, all those arms going in the and the eyes in the wrong direction, this is not what we have in mind for excellence in our organization. Water lilies. Yes, Monet.
[00:19:26] Now Picasso, come, all right, I've got your personal development plan, so that we get rid of all those arms and funny eyes going in the wrong direction. Right? We don't do that.
[00:19:40] Why do we do it in organizations? Why do we think there's only one sort of beacon of excellence in an organization? It doesn't make any sense. Right? So if we focus on outcomes,
[00:19:54] if we catch people in the act of doing something excellent and say, hey, this is how it made me feel, that was so cool.
[00:20:04] Right? I'm in a meeting and somebody's like not saying anything and they're asking me, so Jenny, how how, can you say more about that? What are you thinking about this? How can we do that? The fact that you asked me those questions made me feel that I could give my opinion in a very safe place. So if we focus on outcomes, if we catch people in the act of doing something excellent and say, hey, this is how it made me feel. That was so cool.
[00:20:03] Right? I'm in a meeting and somebody's like not saying anything and they're asking me, so Jenny, how can you say more about that? What are you thinking about this? How can we do that? The fact that you asked me those questions made me feel that I could give my opinion in a very safe place. Right? So we can focus on the outcome and and learn from the things that that we're already doing well, recognizing those things and then building on them. Okay, how could you take those questions and bring them into another setting?
[00:20:42] So, focusing on outcomes, catching people in the act of doing something excellent. And helping recognize and reinforce that is a way to increase learning and of course, performance in an organization. So excellence is not one size fits all. We can have different different definitions of excellence. All right.
[00:21:07] Can I give you some feedback? Yes, my amygdala is activated. Um, many years ago now. Uh, it was I think one of my first talks actually. And I was super, super nervous, really nervous.
[00:21:25] Um, and I spent a lot of time preparing, lots of time preparing. I wanted to be just really smart, sort of proving myself, this was before I understood that it was better to be unproving myself rather than proving myself. In any case, um, after this, uh, session,
[00:21:46] I was exhausted. Um, I'm an introvert, so I get my energy from within, so putting myself out there in front of a lot of people in a new situation was really energy draining. And somebody that I really, I still respect, um, really respected in the Agile community, she came up to me afterwards and she said, Jenny, can I give you some feedback?
[00:22:18] My response inside my head was certainly not, yeah, bring it on.
[00:22:25] It was, yeah.
[00:22:28] I I won't curse. I'm trying really hard not to curse in my talks anymore.
[00:22:35] But what could I say, right? I couldn't say, yeah, screw you. No, thank you. So I said, of course, well, yes, sure. And she proceeded to point out every place that I had made a mistake.
[00:22:50] And I was so defeated. I just thought, okay, I'd spent all this time and did this session and really is there I didn't get any bread in my sandwich, I only got the ham. I come on.
[00:23:08] And I said, after she finished, I said, thank you for your feedback.
[00:23:17] I was not at all thankful for her feedback.
[00:23:21] And when I reflected on this, I thought, okay, if I am going to continue to give talks at conferences or be up in front of people, training, whatever it is. I need to learn how to deal with people who are saying, can I give you some feedback, right?
[00:23:37] So, I decided that my mechanism, my tool for this would be,
[00:23:44] yes, my answer is yes to, can I give you some feedback? I would listen and listen without judgment, or at least try not to show my judgment.
[00:23:56] And then at the end say, thank you for your feedback.
[00:24:01] And over time, what I found is that I actually became thankful for that feedback.
[00:24:09] Because I was able to take things in that made sense for me. I was in control of the feedback. So I could say later, not directly to the person, thinking about it later, okay, this made sense or this didn't make sense or I want to change this or I don't want to change that. I was in control.
[00:24:33] I am in control of how I use the feedback. And also understanding that people see things in different ways, and just because they may say it in a very strong way or maybe have a higher status in an organization or in the Agile community or wherever it is, it doesn't mean that they're right.
[00:24:54] So I had control. And that was the magic. Because now, when I get feedback, I truly, truly mean thank you for your feedback. So my answer is yes, please, give me the feedback. I get to decide what's useful and not useful. I get to try things based on that. And for me now, getting feedback is actually a dopamine rush. It's like, yes. Because I can just push aside all the ham that I don't like and take the ham that I that I actually do like. And make changes based on that.
[00:25:31] So we can train our brains to build stronger connections around being okay with getting feedback. Even if you're not asking for it.
[00:25:43] I did a workshop. Yeah, I I don't know how many years ago now, but it's something that really is imprinted in my memory. I mentioned that I'm an introvert, so whenever I do workshops, I always try to design exercises in a way that I think, okay, well, if I'm willing to do it, it must be okay for others. For other introverts.
[00:26:09] And um, this little workshop was called flirting with your customers. So it was about how to create relationships, deeper relationships with your customers. And there were some exercises and there might have been a little Abba music playing in the background. Um, I don't think there was any dancing, but but there was music. And um, afterwards, I was sort of soaking in the accolades of the people who were in the room saying, oh, this was such a great workshop, great session and really fun and learning rich and I was like, oh, yes.
[00:26:47] Dopamine.
[00:26:50] A couple days later, I got a very long email from one of the participants.
[00:26:55] And in it, he basically said, I'll paraphrase. This session was shit for introverts.
[00:27:04] And it was super painful for me. He he was actually more, um, constructive than that, um, but in my threat state, my amygdala activated. Um, egocentric discounting in motion. Thinking, well, all the other people liked it.
[00:27:24] And here's the one that didn't.
[00:27:28] And he gave me some ideas, specific things that I could do differently.
[00:27:33] And I set it aside. It was really painful. It hurt me.
[00:27:38] Because all the, you know, good positive feedback that I had gotten was totally wiped out by the one email, which, you know, you could say that's something about my own brain. But in any case, I went back to it a couple days later and really went through it and thought, okay, what can I learn from this? What can I do differently next time? So pain, it was painful, plus reflection equals progress.
[00:28:09] So high performers are asking for feedback often, at least two to three times a week and more often than that. And it's painful when when we get feedback.
[00:28:25] Sometimes.
[00:28:28] If we can set aside that pain, set aside our own egos. And think about, okay, how can I use this?
[00:28:37] How can I take a piece of this and change how I'm doing whatever it is I'm doing? Then I can make some progress.
[00:28:46] And becoming better is really a mindset shift.
[00:28:50] So, taking in feedback, using it to become better and better. This is a mindset. We can train our brains to be able to do this. And the the neuroscientific, um, term for this is called mental contrasting. So what we do is we we understand where we are right now. And then we picture ourselves in the future, where we want to be.
[00:29:21] And think about, okay, what are those obstacles in our way?
[00:29:27] What are the things that are getting in our way of us going from where we are now to where we want to be? And these can be simple things or they can be big things. Of course, it's easier to build on the things that you're already good at, remember. Um, but we also may want to refocus. So where we are now to where we want to be. So, this is not some like lofty thing where I I say, oh, well, okay, I'm not very patient, so I want to become patient.
[00:29:59] And think that that's going to happen. That is so not going to happen. Maybe I am also realizing through the mental contrasting that the obstacles to me becoming what I would call patient are just overwhelming for me. So maybe I need to accept that that's not going to happen and improve other things. And that is also part of mental contrasting. So we see the things that we can achieve.
[00:30:26] And we see the path to making that happen. And if we don't see it, we ask the questions of people around us. This is where I am now, this is my perception of where I am now, and this is where I want to be.
[00:30:40] Can you help me? Can you give me some advice? What's worked for you? And even if it's worked for them, it may not work for you, but you can take tippets from that.
[00:30:51] So mental contrasting is the way that that we make improvements that we can take feedback in and be able to use that for our own improvement.
[00:31:02] So asking for feedback.
[00:31:06] That's the key. Giving feedback that's unsolicited, that's unwanted, just doesn't work. It puts us into a threat state, where amygdala is activated. It shuts down our focused thinking. So when we ask for feedback, it does the opposite. It makes us open to improvements.
[00:31:30] There's less threat.
[00:31:33] It can be fast, focused. Specific. We can get feedback from a lot of different people, not just our bosses, for example, who we may not trust. Right? So asking for feedback, creating a culture where we ask for feedback. It's a habit.
[00:31:51] And in the beginning, it's not so nice to ask for feedback. So my suggestion always is to reduce the threat. So, for some people, just asking for feedback and on one little piece of a meeting or one piece of code or whatever, something very small, shrink it.
[00:32:11] Don't ask for feedback on the entire workshop if you're running a workshop, for example.
[00:32:18] Ask for feedback on how was I when I asked questions? Did I ask open questions or closed questions? I want feedback just on that.
[00:32:28] So reduce the threat.
[00:32:31] Start by asking people that you trust.
[00:32:35] That's much easier, right? So I can ask for feedback from my husband or he can just give it to me, sometimes I just say, you're full of it. Um, but most of the time, I can take it in and not feel threatened by him because I trust him, I know that he has my best interest at heart. So ask for feedback from people you trust. And then, as you get more comfortable or as the people around you get more comfortable with asking for feedback, ask for feedback in scarier and scarier situations.
[00:33:10] Put yourself out there, make yourself vulnerable. And get that feedback. It might be a little pain. Um, pain plus reflection equals progress.
[00:33:21] So asking for feedback, that's the problem we want to solve for. Create an environment where we ask for feedback. Now, sometimes people don't ask for feedback. So you could have a working agreement in your teams that, you know, in our team, we're going to ask each other for feedback at least once a day. On one thing once a day.
[00:33:40] You can set up reward systems, you can do whatever you want in order to get the habit of asking for feedback. If people don't ask for feedback and you want to create this culture, a way to do it is just say, hey, you know, the research shows that giving feedback doesn't work. So we want people to ask for feedback instead. And we want you to be in control of that. What is it that you want feedback on? What kind of feedback is helpful for you? That's the question that I ask. What kind of feedback is helpful for you?
[00:34:16] And most of the time people are like, what?
[00:34:20] Yeah. I'm not just going to give you feedback. I have my ideas, it's my own perspective, I could be wrong. So, what kind of feedback is helpful for you? Do you want it just on this part or what?
[00:34:34] You want it on the whole thing?
[00:34:38] Ah, I get to decide. Okay. So we start getting people in the habit of doing that. And when you're giving feedback to someone who's asked for feedback, share your observations, try to make it tangible, right? Physical evidence. This is what I saw. This is what I heard.
[00:34:58] Maybe you've got statistics like me, I don't know. And then interpret it, this is how it made you feel.
[00:35:06] I felt great when you did this.
[00:35:10] And then the next part is, how can you do more of that? How could you take that and do it in different situations? So building on and and refocusing. All right. So now I think I've talked, um, a lot. And I want to open it up for questions around feedback. And because of how our brains work, it's really hard to go from listening to asking questions. It's just, it's a hard thing to do. So instead, before the questions or sharing your thoughts around feedback, I want you to talk to each other about what you've heard, um, from my talk today, and also maybe some reflections that you have about feedback yourselves. So I want to give you a couple minutes just to talk to each other and then I'll ask you to share.
[00:38:20] Okay.
[00:38:22] So now if you would please share. So what you're talking about or any questions that you might have.
[00:38:41] Yes.
[00:38:44] Sorry.
[00:38:53] So, I was wondering, uh, you talk about a lot of correction feedbacks. What about reinforcement feedbacks when you want to highlight something positive to make a behavior continue and so on?
[00:38:21] Okay. So now,
[00:38:29] If you would please share. So, what you're talking about or any questions that you might have.
[00:38:42] Yes.
[00:38:45] Sorry.
[00:38:54] So I was wondering, uh you talk about a lot of correction feedbacks. What about reinforcement feedbacks when you want to highlight something positive to make a behavior continue and so on.
[00:39:09] Do we need, do we need to do this way or can we make this kind of feedback more easily?
[00:39:16] Okay. So, um, I I just want to make sure that I understand your question. That giving positive feedback and not being asked for example. Somebody's not asking for feedback, but you want to give some positive feedback. Yeah, I don't see any problem with that. Um, it it's praise, right? You're recognizing something that someone did well, and you're reinforcing that. So, um, yes, giving positive feedback is uh is definitely okay from a brain perspective. It doesn't put anyone into the threat state. We may not believe it, um, but that's has to do with the person themselves. So, yeah. Yeah, that's a good distinction. Thank you for that. Yeah.
[00:40:05] Thank you for for this talk. Um, I was wondering what do you think about the platform that um make people giving positive feedback mainly to other people like with the little hearts or a little, you know, plus one and everything. What do you think about that?
[00:40:25] Yeah. Um, you know, by itself, it's a it's a nice thing. I think the the issue with it is that it becomes a popularity contest and that suddenly your brain gets dependent, you know, you you you get a dopamine rush when you get a little heart or a like or whatever on on social media, for example. And and that feels really good. And then when you don't get it, it's like, okay, well, what's wrong with me now? And pretty soon you're sort of dependent on those likes. For getting that dopamine rush in the brain. So there's a balance there, and I don't I yeah, maybe someone else has the answer. Um, I think in the long run it probably does more damage than it's good in the short term.
[00:41:21] Yeah. But that's just my opinion. I could be wrong. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:41:30] Making you run.
[00:41:32] Yep.
[00:41:33] That's great.
[00:41:42] Hi, uh so thank you. Um, I was wondering about a situation from a manager's perspective, for example, where you see someone is not doing the thing the proper way or the way you expect them to do. And you feel like they're not ready for your feedback, should you wait until they are or should you go for it anyway?
[00:42:04] Great, thank you for your question. So things that, you know, require sort of checklists, safety procedures like uh before surgery, you know, in a hospital or in the cockpit of an airplane or um, you know, things that we do around definition of done or acceptance criteria checklists things.
[00:42:29] Those are different, right? We're we are complying to things, a procedure if you will. And saying, hey, hello, we we need to check these off. I don't really count that as feedback. I I see that as, okay, are we doing the things that we need to do in order to deliver the value or do the thing that that's the right thing to do. Feedback is more about how to improve our performance. So it could be that I noticed that we missed or you missed these checkboxes. What happened? That's more about looking at the the compliance to the procedure rather than thinking about performance feedback. It could be something in the system was getting in the way of making sure that the the procedure was followed if you will. So in that case, I mean, I think it's important to say, hey, we've got a procedure. What got in the way? So, and by asking the what got in the way instead of why are you so stupid and you missed that, not that any managers would ever do that. Um, it takes the the blame if you will away from the person and puts it into the environment. So then you can have a conversation about, well, what's in the system that's blocking us from doing the right thing. Um, and and that's, I don't know, a a subtle difference between sort of following a procedure, looking at the environment, and then feedback around performance. Does that make sense? Okay. Okay. Thanks. Thanks. What else? What else were you talking about?
[00:44:10] There's a couple over here. Yeah, thank you.
[00:44:21] Um, thank you for your your conference. Um, I'm wondering for teams, can we consider it's the same?
[00:44:30] Giving feedback to teams.
[00:44:33] Yeah. So, do you want to say more about that what you're thinking around the
[00:44:39] I I mean that all what you said can be applied to a team about feedback. Uh waiting for the team asking feedback and creating an environment of feedback, everything.
[00:44:52] Yes, of course. And there are a lot of things built into Agile ways of working where we get feedback already, uh certainly in our demos where we get feedback from customers and closing those feedback loops are really important. Um, and then in the retrospectives, it's a really nice sort of built-in way to get feedback on how the team performed either in the sprint if you're working in a sprint or I hope if you're using Kanban that you're also stopping periodically to have retrospectives, maybe you're having one every day, what what got in the way of our performance? And that's a way of asking for feedback from each other. So yes, um, you know, of course, uh that's an aggregate if you will when we look at team feedback. And I think retrospectives are the natural place for that. And teams are made up of individuals, right? So, um, when we have a team that's established and there's trust in that team, then we can give each other feedback, ask each other for feedback on specific things that will help our performance. So, yeah, absolutely. And it could be part of a working agreement, right, that we ask each other every day for feedback. Yeah. Yeah, thanks.
[00:46:07] Okay.
[00:46:12] There's another one, another question from this lady here.
[00:46:19] Uh thank you for your your talk. Uh I would like to know if you have special advice or tips to help or encourage people to ask for feedback and beginning from people that they trust.
[00:46:36] Yeah, yeah. So it it's a habit and we need to help people start the habit if you will. Um, and and what I normally do when I'm working with organizations to to help them create this ask for feedback culture is to say, okay, here's the science behind feedback, so talking to the rational part of our brains. So that there's statistics around it, there's research, there's brain science if you will that shows where the blood is flowing under different feedback conditions. And we know from the research that high performers get feedback often. So, what we want to do is create a culture where we ask each other for feedback. And in order to do that, what are your ideas? So I would turn it over to people and say, okay, what are the things that we can do to encourage each other to ask for feedback? Here are things that other organizations do.
[00:47:38] What kind of feedback is helpful for you before going into a meeting? Or if a team is running a demo for customers? Okay, what kind of feedback aside from the the stuff that we're demoing, but how the demo actually ran, what kind of feedback is helpful for you so we can make those demos more interesting or or encourage more stakeholders to come, for example. So there are things that we can put into place and by involving and engaging people. So start with the science behind it, the research. And then say, we want to stop giving feedback that's a waste and instead we want to create this ask for feedback culture, whether it's just in our team or in the entire organization. And then turn it over to people. Okay, what are ways that we can do this? How can we ask for feedback? We know that high performers ask for feedback at least two to three times a week, and we know that um in order to improve, we need to have that feedback and we're in control of it. We can decide what feedback we use and what feedback we don't. So as long as people feel that they're in control of it, we reduce the threat and then we're more likely to ask for it. And what happens over time, at least in my experience, is that people are more and more willing to ask for feedback, it's just like, okay, this is what we do. This is part of what we do. It becomes a habit just like brushing our teeth.
[00:49:05] Thanks.
[00:49:06] Yeah, thank you.
[00:49:09] There's another question from the lady in the middle up here.
[00:49:22] Hi, uh thank you very much for your talk. Um, is there uh like a limit, um, can we get too much feedback once at a time that we can't maybe process?
[00:49:36] Probably.
[00:49:38] Um, yeah, probably.
[00:49:42] So again, what immediately came to mind is um uh I do quite a lot of trainings for organizations and um have stolen the perfection game, so net promoter score plus the perfection game, which is what I like and to make it perfect some specific uh suggestions to make things perfect. And so that's that's my feedback form, the evaluation form for the trainings. And, you know, there could be up to 25 people in the training, and I can tell you at the end of the training day, I pretty much don't want to go through all those. It's it's it's just so much for me to take in. But then the next day I'll go through it, actually I'll I'll go through real quick to look at the net promoter scores and then maybe a few of the what to do to make perfect. But then I have to like back off and go back to it. So, um, you know, it depends on where we are, where we are. If we're in a place where our prefrontal cortex is just open and curious and interested, we're not tired, we're not hungry, we're not thirsty, we're not stressed, we can take a lot of stuff in. We can take a lot in. But if we're tired, if we're stressed, if we're hungry, if we're thirsty, it's like, oh, no, not right now. Especially the the not so positive feedback, the idea is to make it better. It's hard to take in. Because it's easier to be in that threat state when we're tired and hungry and stressed. Yeah. Yeah, thank you. Any other last minute questions?
[00:51:25] All right. Okay, thank you. Um, so, uh, I want to ask you for your feedback, and um what you liked about the talk and what I could do to make it perfect. This is only my second time doing this talk. So I would really, really love your feedback. And because um I too am challenging myself to ask for feedback in scarier and scarier situations. If you want to give your feedback on Twitter,
[00:51:55] I would really, really appreciate it. So thank you in advance for your feedback. Thank you.

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