Framework for a Feedback Message

While the core of performance feedback is impact and authoritative messages, the effectiveness of feedback is affected by how well you frame the core feedback message when delivering it. The framework has three components that support the core feedback message: intent, situation, and behavior.

Intent

If you don’t tell the feedback receiver why you are giving feedback, he or she will invent a reason. This takes us back to the first feedback principle: The feedback receiver determines how to react to the feedback. This tendency among feedback receivers is practically universal. As feedback is coming their way, receivers consciously or unconsciously speculate about why you are giving it, or they make up a story about your motivations, or they form a judgment of you based on how they feel about the feedback. Your best course of action is to make your intent clear in the beginning so the receiver focuses on the feedback and not on you.

Intent can be implicit or explicit. If the feedback receiver knows you well enough and the process of giving feedback has been well established, you need not make your intent explicit every time. However, when there is any chance of your intent being misinterpreted, you are wise to make it explicit. For example:

•  “In order to solve some problems that have come to my attention, I would like to offer some feedback.”

Situation

Feedback is about something the receiver did, or did not do, in a context of time, place, and circumstance. In cases where that context is not self-evident, describing it is critical to making feedback effective and well received. Context often determines what behavior is appropriate and what is not. In one meeting an individual should remain fairly silent and attend to the proceedings; in another meeting the same individual should speak up and take a stand. When you adequately describe the context, feedback receivers understand or remember when and where they were at the time, and what variable conditions were in play that would call for the expression or inhibition of certain behavior. For example:

•  “When you presented our March sales figures to the senior management team last Thursday…”

When you describe the context, be specific about the time and place. Describe the circumstances: who was there, the agenda, and what other people were doing. Check to determine whether the receiver remembers the situation.

Behavior

Feedback givers describe feedback receivers’ observable behaviors—things that could be captured through audio or video recording. Behaviors that can be recorded are sounds (such as words, tone of voice, groans, sighs) and actions (such as body language, gestures, facial expressions, and rolling the eyes). Good behavioral descriptions enable feedback receivers to know exactly what they did that had impact on others. For example:

•  “You provided details when making your point, and you answered questions directly.”

When you describe behavior, be sure to use action verbs instead of verbs of being like is and are. Be concrete and avoid abstractions. Doing so avoids confusion and increases clarity about your message.

Using concrete, behavioral terms is more challenging than you might think. We are so accustomed to using abstractions to communicate that we don’t realize it, and therefore we don’t realize that people may interpret our abstractions differently than we do. Moreover, abstractions that describe behavior are attributions, so we are setting up authoritative feedback whenever we use them.

Use the worksheet on pages 28–29 to practice recognizing concrete descriptions of behavior.