If you’re a supervisor or manager of direct reports, it’s important to hone your communication skills as you move through your career to make your feedback easier to hear so that your conversations are effective. (It’s hard to be candid and compassionate, right?)
Too often, supervisors assume that it’s necessary to choose between efficacy and compassion, as if they’re mutually exclusive. They vacillate between being too nicey-nice or too brusque, but only because they haven’t been trained on how to be frank and kind when offering feedback.
Take a look at three feedback micro-skills that are connection-based and will totally support more productivity, especially for you managerial types who tend to focus on content at the expense of connection:
- Do your prep work
- Focus on expressing your understanding of their perspective
- Follow up, especially if the conversation was tense
Let me break it down by presenting these skills in the context of a few typical feedback traps that can occur before, during, and after important conversations.
Feedback Obstacle #1 – Starting Off a Conversation Charged and Upset
Foregoing the prep work necessary for a big conversation in the interest of saving time is perhaps one of the biggest traps you can fall into: if you walk into a big talk amped up, swirling in anger/anxiety/etc., and frenetically rehearsing your talking points in your head, you can almost count on your conversation going sideways. Very inefficient. Why? Because when you’re worked up, your brain wiring defaults to blame and right/wrong thinking. When you’re in this space, you’ll find it hard to notice the win-win solutions that are right under your nose, no matter how innovative and collaborative you are otherwise.
Try This Instead: Do Your Prep Work Before A Conversation Starts
Set an intention for how you want the conversation to go. Do you want to apologize or make a repair? Build some trust in a difficult relationship with a colleague? Take responsibility? Express something honestly? Consider how you want your words to land, then take adequate time to prep. Find a way to blow off steam and connect to your sense of compassion before any words are exchanged, so you can enter your important conversation feeling 1) grounded, 2) mindful of the other person’s stress level, and 3) totally in touch with your intention.
Feedback Obstacle # 2 – Forcing Your Perspective on Them During A Conversation
You can’t help it. You want so badly to be heard that you continue to assert your perspective and how right you are about it, even when it’s clear the other person isn’t able to take in what you’re saying. Your anger or frustration escalates, and so does their defensiveness. The collaboration gets severed more as things amp up and no one walks away feeling heard. You may feel a little better having blown off some steam, but the relationship is more strained than when you started.
Try This Instead: Help Them Feel Understood So They Actually Have Space To REALLY Hear You
Use every ounce of patience you’ve got to listen to the other person talk as long as they’re stressed or in the red zone. Check the weather of the conversation every few minutes to make sure they’re feeling understood. “So you really want me to get that…? Is… the gist of this part you just said? Is there more you really want me to know?”
So yes, you listen and then listen more until they’re done and truly able to hear your perspective. How do you know when that is? Try this, “Got it. I have some stuff coming up. Do you have room to hear a few of my thoughts?” The conversation might feel like it’s slow when you’re waiting so long to share your perspective, but trust me. Connection is building and, if they are really feeling understood by you, this is important progress. Taking the high road isn’t just generous, it builds a strong foundation that’ll save you time in the long run.
Feedback Obstacle #3 – Ignoring Unresolved Topics After Wrapping Up
You wash your hands of an uncomfortable topic just as soon as you can get away with it. Then you hope and pray the challenge will work itself out. AKA “burying your head in the sand.”
Try This Instead: Proactive Communication Follow-ups
Watch for cues that indicate whether your foundation in any important work relationship is holding or needs some patch-ups. When you sense a subtle agitation, be proactive rather than wait for another explosion to tear down whatever connection you’ve got. Use your skills for making repairs and expressing regrets.
Building relational capital is longer term investment. Send me your comments. How has a relational approach supported efficiency in your roles?
