Positive and Negative Feedback How to Give It in 9 Steps

Give positive or negative feedback is to use communication methods to transmit and receive information about the adequacy or inappropriateness of our work. In a first approximation to this concept, you may think that these are negative aspects that bosses communicate to the employees of a company.

Positive feedback realizes something has been done well. For example: “The work has been done in a concise way and is very well understood. Negative feedback occurs when something has been done wrong. For example: "The work is not well understood, it has confusing information".

Both positive and negative serve to improve the performance of the person to whom feedback is given. However, the concept of job feedback is much more extensive, it can be positive or negative, and directed towards an employee, boss or coworker..

As Farr (1993) states, in the work environment there is a lot of information that tells us how we are performing our work. However, it is necessary to make sense of this information, in order to achieve our goals and objectives. Among other things, job feedback will allow you to:

• Fix your performance errors.
• Reduce your uncertainty about the suitability of your job.
• Know how others perceive and evaluate you.

In addition, some of the advantages that you will obtain by giving constructive feedback in your work environment will be:

• Avoid conflicts with colleagues, employees or bosses.
• Have greater satisfaction in the workplace.
• Promote teamwork and be more effective.
• Getting feelings of self-competence at work.

Steps to give positive or negative feedback

For you to put it into practice effectively, we describe 9 steps that you must take into account to develop this communication method:

1 - Choose the time and place well before giving feedback

You should start by asking the other person if they are available at the time. In case she's busy, you should try starting the conversation later.

In this way, the person to whom you give feedback will give you the attention you need to communicate effectively. On the other hand, to choose the scenario, you have to consider the type of information that you are going to provide:

When it comes to positive feedback, you should choose to do it in public, so that the person has even more social recognition of the adequacy of their work.

In the event that you want to communicate some negative aspects, choose a private place so that the worker does not perceive that he is being embarrassed in front of his colleagues.

2 - Don't wait too long to give your opinion

If there is an aspect on which you want to provide feedback to a colleague, employee or boss, do not wait too long. Otherwise, the person will not remember very well what it is about.

For example, if you tell someone that the behavior they had 3 months ago was not appropriate, the person will probably not contextualize what happened, so your feedback will not have the desired effect.

However, if you comment on a positive or negative aspect about something they have done in the last few days, they will be able to take your opinion into account and rectify -if necessary-, since they still have not strayed much from their goal.

In addition, this point is especially important in relation to negative feedback, since if you do not give your opinion immediately, you will accumulate complaints towards a person and you may one day be overwhelmed and communicate everything that bothers you with an aggressive attitude.

This is common in any type of relationship - friends, partners, parents, etc. - If you do not tell the other person what bothers you, it will hardly change their behavior.

3 - Show an empathetic attitude

Put yourself in the shoes of the other with empathy and think about how you would like them to provide you with information about your work and your performance.

Surely you would like the person who is going to comment on some aspect of your work to be empathetic, trying not to damage your feelings when it comes to negative information.

If their work has affected yours in any way, try also not to lose your cool and explain how you feel.

4 - Listen to the other and be flexible

In this communication process, you should have the ability to actively listen - and not just speak. This includes giving the other the opportunity to comment on the difficulties they encountered on their way in relation to that task..

Pay attention to the reasons that led the other person to act that way. Maybe when you know his circumstances, you will understand that he acted in the best possible way.

Have the ability to rectify if you think you are wrong. At the end of the day, the feedback you provide is based on your personal opinion, it is not an absolute truth.

5 - Do not use general and unspecific comments

It is important that you be specific with your comments, instead of giving feedback with vague and general information. It is not the same to say: "good job" than "your last report collects very precise information on the progress of the company".

With the second comment, the other person will feel more valued and will have a greater understanding of their effectiveness at work..

The more specific and concrete the information you provide, the better consequences it will have on the other person's performance - just like the more accurate a compass is, the easier it is for us to steer a ship.-.

6 - Use the "Sandwich Technique"

This technique consists of providing:

1. - A positive criticism, about the aspects you are doing properly or about the effort you are making to achieve the goal.
2. - A negative review, about what you think should be improved to do an effective job.
3. - A positive review, on its general adequacy.

This way, you avoid the initial discomfort of starting with a negative comment, so the person will be more receptive to your opinion. In addition, you manage to leave a good taste in your mouth culminating the conversation with another positive aspect.

The person who receives the feedback will not feel questioned, but will accept it in a more positive way and will be willing to change the negative aspect that you have mentioned.
An example of this technique would be saying to a co-worker:

“Your presentation on recent sales has given me very valuable information. It has been a bit long, but very interesting ".

7 - Use feedback by focusing on the behavior, not the person

It is very important that you choose the words you are going to use well, so as not to criticize the person in question but rather the behavior that they have carried out at a certain moment.

So that you understand it better, it is not the same to say "the project was not delivered on time" than to say "you always deliver the projects late". In the second case, the person may feel that he is being classified as irresponsible and an uncomfortable and unpleasant situation will result.

Also focus on isolated behaviors, so that behaviors are not generalized. Let's see an example in relation to this aspect: It is better to say: "this morning you were 15 minutes late, I would like to know if you have had any problems" than: "you are very late".

As you can see, in the first example it focuses on the behavior of being late - in addition to showing an empathic attitude about it.-.

In the second sentence, on the contrary, it is aggressive, cataloging the person based on some facts that sometimes constitute the exception, not the norm..

8 - In negative feedback, give options of how the task could be performed better

When the feedback you give is negative, add comments aimed at improving the work. This will help the other person to know how they should carry out their work in a productive way..

For example, if you did not like the way in which a worker has served a client, you could say something like: “This morning I observed that the client was dissatisfied with your explanation about payment through financing. On another occasion, you can offer an explanatory brochure so that they understand it better ".

9 - Encourage others to give you their opinions about your work

Especially if it is an employee of yours, you should encourage this dynamic and exchange of information, so that you too can benefit from the advantages of having immediate and concrete information about your work.

Knowing the opinions of the workers around you will help you manage your own boat, as we mentioned at the beginning of this article..

We hope that all these tips will help you improve your communication with your co-workers and achieve greater job satisfaction..

And you, what other tips for positive or negative feedback would you add??

References

1. Ana I. García Álvarez and Anastasio Ovejero Bernal. The Measurement of Work Feedback in Organizations: Adaptation of the Job Feedback Survey questionnaire. Psicothema, 1998. Vol. 10, No. 2, pp. 241-257.
2. Carlos Eduardo Román Maldonado. On feedback or feedback in online higher education. "Virtual Magazine Universidad Católica del Norte". No.26, (February - May 2009, Colombia).
3. Ignacio Boss. Why give Feedback? How to do it effectively? (2001) CEMA University.
4. M. I. Ferrero and M. Martín. The importance of constructive feedback in the evaluation of group musical performances.
5. Sherry E. Moss, Enzo R. Valenzi, William Taggart. Are You Hiding from Your Boss? The Development of a Taxonomy and Instrument to Assess the Feedback Management Behaviors of Good and Bad Performers. Journal of Management (2003).