THOUGHTS ON LEADERSHIP #9 - Give feedback.

Feedback, positive or negative, is critical for a Leader to dispense regularly! If your team only hears from you once a year you are not providing them with critical, real-time information for learning or self- correction.

If during a mid-year or end-of-year review, your team is hearing negative or positive feedback for the first time, then shame on you. Feedback should be a constant, almost daily discussion. There should be no question at the end of the year, at review time, how you as the leader perceive your people, how they are growing and learning, driving great outcomes. There should be zero surprises at that meeting.

When your team member completes their self-evaluation, they should be confident that your response will be, "I agree!" It should be that simple. Clearly, it's not that way all the time, but if your response is a surprise, you've failed as a Leader. Feedback must be constant, interactive, and more of a daily conversation. Talk to your team before, during, and after a project and go through it. The outcome and their performance will be clear if communication is constant and engaging. 

As you begin a new project, review the last one and honestly evaluate the outcome. What worked; what didn't work and why. During the project, continually guide people, course correct, adjust resources and, right after the project, sit down and talk about it. How do they feel about it? Do they feel like they had the right resources, understood the desired outcome? Most importantly, how do they feel about their contribution? 

Negative feedback is always given in private. Period. Critical coaching and redirection must be given in private. There's nothing more demoralizing to anyone than being told they failed in public.

Positive feedback should be given in public when appropriate. You can do that in private as well. But find a way to deliver positive feedback as publicly as you can. Again, give people an opportunity to succeed. Build them up.