Be clear

Giving constructive feedback is more respectful than letting an issue fester

In the cartoon version of the workplace, bosses are overly critical. But if you’ve ever managed people, you know there’s a problem with this stereotype. Giving negative feedback is actually really hard.

Maybe you’ve got a team member who talks too much in meetings and has a tendency to ramble, but you keep ignoring it because you don’t want to hurt his feelings. Or maybe someone sends emails that are way too informal for your industry, and you’ve brought up the issue, but in a vague way that doesn’t get the message across. For instance, maybe you make some blanket statement in a meeting that “we all need to work on clear communication.” Really?

Your colleague comes away thinking yep, I’m clear and everyone likes my friendliness and effusiveness, not knowing people are cringing through every message.

We might tell ourselves we’re not direct because we want to spare the other person’s feelings. But if the feedback wouldn’t be delivered in a hurtful or humiliating way, then in truth the actual motivation is to spare awkwardness for ourselves. That’s not considerate of the other person at all. And here’s a statistic that might make you pause. There’s some evidence that women get less clear and actionable feedback at work than men do from their managers. That means women are losing out on chances to improve.

Clear feedback shows that you are taking someone seriously, because you want them to get the chance to do great things in the future.

So if there’s something that needs to be said or made known, it’s compassionate, respectful, and productive to communicate it directly.

Now that doesn’t mean it needs to be done in front of a lot of people, or in any sort of mean way. It just needs to be clear. James, you need to share air time in the meeting. See if you can make your point in 2-3 sentences max. I’ll nod at you when you need to wrap it up. I think you’ll see that you can end your statements a lot earlier than you’re ending.

Or Mary, your emails need to be more professional. Go through and take out most of the exclamation points. No slang or emojis please. Let’s go through one of your drafts together and rewrite it. I’m sure we can still make it sound like you, but feel respectful for your clients.

If you’re feeling ambivalent about being clear, put yourself in the other person’s shoes. Consider what facts and feedback you would want and how you’d like to hear them. Depending on the circumstances, you can also ask the person whether they would like feedback and whether this is a good time. But trust me, I always want to know if I have spinach in my teeth. I’m guessing most other people would too.