For Those Who Have A Complicated Relationship With Feedback
Sara Ismail-Beigi Bartlett speaks with guests about their ideas, perspectives, and best practices regarding feedback. For some, this process can be alarming, but it is essential and a key basis for improvement.
In this episode we bring on Devon, an Operations Manager at a local contract manufacturer. In his role, he often provides action oriented feedback to achieve production goals. We discuss how giving feedback should be evidence based for greatest impact. Subscribe to this podcast so you never miss an episode!
Welcome to Can I Offer You Some Feedback? My name is Sara, and this is the podcast for those who have a complicated relationship with feedback and are looking to hear from real people across levels and industries with their ideas, perspectives, and best practices on feedback. Before we dive in, I'd like to introduce our guest on the podcast today, Devon. He's an operations manager at a local contract manufacturer. Welcome to the conversation today.
Devon:
Hi, Sarah. Thanks for having me.
Sara:
Let's kick things off with the main question of the podcast. When I say the phrase, "Can I offer you some feedback?" what's your gut reaction when you hear that?
Devon:
I immediately think something is wrong. To preface, feedback sort of implies negativity because positive feedback is so easy and natural. "Hey, good job." "Hey, thanks." There's no starter intro sentence to,
"Here's my feedback," in my mind.
Sara:
And so the fact that that person is asking you the question puts you on high alert, right?
Devon:
Right. "Hey, do you want the good news or the bad news?"
Sara:
And so when you're thinking about that feedback, Devon, do you prefer to give feedback or do you prefer to receive feedback?
Devon:
I would prefer to receive more feedback. Given my role and responsibilities in manufacturing, I provide most of the feedback to the employees, to the sales group, to all of the affected employees for our performance. "That was good. That worked. We need to do better." Feedback at my position is much more intermittent, end of a quarter, end of a month. "That was bad. You didn't do good enough. Can I offer you some feedback? No one knows what they're doing." So it's not as routine as I would like.
Sara:
Yeah. Do you find that with that feedback, it's more operationally focused rather than you as a
performer?
Devon:
Far and away, it's more the performance of the business, as certainly that is what I have been tasked with taking care of. The better members of my group, certainly my manager, infrequent intervals does provide that feedback of, "Hey, when you told them to try harder, the reason it didn't work was this."
Right? And so there's some feedback as far as delivery or messaging, but most of it is more measurable in, "That was not enough units made."
Sara:
Right, right. Well, when you're thinking about feedback then, and I think it's helpful to have that context of is it operational, is it performance related? How would you define meaningful feedback?
Devon:
I define meaningful feedback certainly as evidence-based, which makes the operational feedback very tangible. There is a measurement there. We were supposed to do a thousand units, we did 900. Right? Feedback is based in objective reality. The much more subjective reality can be very important, but it gets nuanced as far as, "I didn't like that." Well, okay, based on what? Based on your likes versus mine? Then it is almost a communication issue, not just a feedback issue.
Sara:
Or even tying into a preference, right?
Devon:
Sure.
Sara:
If it's, "Did we meet the goal?" It's kind of hard. You can't be like, "Well, depends on what you mean by goal." Hopefully we were clear enough about what the goal was, but did we do it well or was there satisfaction or what was the ... Et cetera.
Devon:
Sure.
Sara:
Those are a little more, as you were saying, subjective or a little more nebulous when you're thinking about measurements.
Devon:
Oh, nebulous. Good word.
Sara:
That's my SAT prep.
Devon:
Man, I love it.
Sara:
When you're thinking about examples or experiences where you've seen that meaningful feedback delivered, what comes to mind?
Devon:
I would like to think I have provided meaningful feedback to a number of our operators starting with that objective evidence of machine can go this fast, but our production rate was some mathematically lower number than what the machines are capable of. Right? So first it's sort of gathering additional information of, "Hey, do you know why we're not producing at this rate or meeting these objectives?" It'd be nice if they provided the feedback and knew the answer, but when that's not available, it becomes that conversation of, "Well, we need to do better. Here's what I know from my experiences that are opportunities for lost time or lost productivity." So my feedback to those employees of, "Let's conquer the small things, and if there is something looming and large that should present itself, but first and foremost, this isn't the productivity or the goals that we have in mind."
Sara:
And was that modeled for you with ... I know you've been in the manufacturing space for a long time. Where have you seen that before? It's not something they teach in engineering
Devon:
No.
Sara:
-curriculum at all, to my understanding.
Devon:
No, that was not a collegiate course. In a prior life, I worked for a much larger corporation, and they had managerial training. So you would go to weeks or two weeks' worth of training, how to manage different age groups, what motivates the different generations you may encounter in the workforce. One of the strongest tactics that stood with me was you need to be able to present them information they cannot refute. Right? "You were supposed to make 10 and you made seven." But then be part of the solution there afterward of, "We need to get that other three." And it's a we. So, yes. I'm not going to be turning screws or soldering boards, or ... At least that's not what I'm supposed to be doing. But I can certainly set up those employees for better success if it's tooling, if it's training. And that was very early in my career as far as what that corporation thought a good manager needed to be able to do
Sara:
If you're thinking about either with your own teams or just people in general, if I could grant you a wish for one thing you would hope people would do better regarding feedback, what might it be?
Devon:
I wish more team members, employees, supervisors, you name it, had a larger grasp of the variables. So the feedback could be very simple as far as seven out of 10 units were made, or whatever less concrete goal I gave you was partially met. The wish would be for both the giver of the feedback and the receiver to know enough of the surrounding variables to know how to change that outcome. So often feedback ends with, "That wasn't good enough. Try harder." And the conversation ends. That's the ineffective feedback. And my wish being if everyone knew all the variables at play all the time, which would border on omnipotence, but lots of problems would be solved if more people understood where they came from.
Sara:
Yeah. And having that access to information even or curiosity aboutDevon:
Sure.
Sara:
-why it's not working or ...
Devon:
Right. Seven's better than six. No. Okay, yes.
Sara:
Technically true.
Devon:
Seven is better than six, but if you don't know how you got to seven, it's very hard for me to get you to eight or get you to nine.
Sara:
Right. Right. And especially if it was five the week before, six the week at prior. Why is there variability?
Devon:
Right. Right.
Sara:
Why does it change? And having those conversations with folks.
Devon:
Yeah. So that wish, everyone can provide the, "Hey, that's not good enough," but it would be a wish and a dream for everyone to understand how to make it better.
Sara:
Yeah. Excellent. Well, for our last question in our time together, Devon, can I offer you some feedback?
Devon:
Absolutely, Sara.
Sara:
Fantastic. One of the things that I've really enjoyed as a part of our relationship, whether in school, activities that we do, board games, whatever it may be, I really appreciate ... And you definitely provide a lot of feedback. I love that it's action oriented and that it's we oriented, as you hinted to a little bit earlier. It's a roll-up-your-sleeves attitude that you have that's like, "Yep, this is the situation. Let's get started." And I think that that is exciting for folks, it's inspiring for folks, and it gets it going. Whether the task is prepping for an activity, getting something started, or just addressing the behemoth of an obstacle that we have in front of us. It's, I think, a way of getting folks energized around addressing really large issues. And I think that that, again, roll-up-your-sleeve's attitude and that positivity towards taking one step at a time, working one problem at a time
Devon:
Sure.
Sara:
I'm sure it comes up in your day. I know we've certainly talked about a lot of professional situations, but I also see it in your personal life, too. We've got huge obstacles, but here's the first step. Then we do the second step, then we do the third one, and really seeing that momentum build over time. So I know that's something that I'm grateful for, even though I don't say it all the time. But I do want to say it in the sense of I really do think it impacts your work and your ability to show up not only at work, but also in your personal life as well. So I wanted to say thank you for that.
Devon:
Well, I appreciate that feedback, Sara. Thank you.
Sara:
Well, Devon, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me, and thanks to you for joining us in another episode of Can I Offer You Some Feedback? You can reach me [email protected]. We would love to hear from you on your thoughts on feedback or any other perspectives you'd like to hear from next. As always, give us a quick rating on your platform of choice and share this podcast with a friend. And I'm hoping that tomorrow you take a chance and offer some feedback when it's needed most.