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The best way to create a culture of feedback

Feedback is important. Feedback is lacking. We need more feedback. That’s a reasoning you often hear. And what do we do then? Since feedback is a skill, we obviously set up a training. That’s logical, after all. Isn’t it?

But I know many cases where this approach didn’t work. They did not end up as a feedback-rich organisation. These training programs often do not deliver on their promise!

Reasons why feedback training fails

Feedback trainings highlight the importance and focus on the techniques on how best to deliver feedback. They explain why I-messages are better than You-messages. They instruct how to use tools like Situation-Behaviour-Feeling-Impact. They use roleplays and group discussions. They give tips to overcome barriers and develop habits. But still, they fail to create a culture of feedback.

In practice, there are three main reasons why managers don’t give feedback.
1. Managers find it just “easier not to react” (sic)
2. Managers assume the probability of behaviour change to be low
3. Managers prefer to avoid the tension it injects into the relationship

    These reasons look at feedback from the angle of the interpersonal relationship with others. But also the operational context plays a role. Does the organizational or team culture stimulate giving feedback? Do influencers and other leaders practice it?

    Even when given, (negative) feedback hardly works

    Some people argue negative feedback has either no or a negative effect. In an interview, Charles Jacobs, puts it like this: “Negative feedback from a manager conflicts with our self-image, and so our minds reduce the dissonance in the easiest way possible, such as ignoring, discounting, or rationalizing away the feedback.”

    A recent study at Harvard Business School found that negative feedback rarely leads to improvement because people tend to ‘shop for confirmation’: people who received criticism from peers looked for new relationships. Even though the negative feedback is supposed to help, it’s perceived as a threat. Shopping for confirmation is grounded in the idea that a positive view of one’s self requires social connections that help us sustain that view. If we don’t have them, we’ll look for them.

    So, give up on feedback?

    No. That’s not the best strategy. We expect employees to grow and improve. And feedback is necessary to do so. But at the same time, employees need to feel valued. They need appreciation for the value they bring to the organisation. So how can we create a culture of feedback?

    No, start slow and by yourself

    As leaders, what can we do to create a culture of feedback? We should start ourselves and start small.

    1. Connect and create trust
    Make sure you get to know your team members. Focus on the other for the other’s sake, not just as a means to one’s own ends. It’s not about your benefit of trying to be trusted. Show authentic interest and consider gained connection and trust as welcome outcomes of a more primary focus on the other.
    At work, we often feel we should focus on task completion. But intentionally building social ties at work is important. A Google study found that managers who “express interest in and concern for team members’ success and personal well-being” outperform others.

    2. Make people feel valuable
    Give positive feedback. Praise achievement. And praise effort when it leads to the goal of learning and improving. The power of positive feedback and recognition is clear. If you make people feel appreciated, supported to learn and safe to express themselves, your business will thrive.

    3. Use feedforward instead of feedback
    Feedback is often unsolicited and focused on the past. Marshall Goldsmith’s feedforward is the opposite. It is all about suggestions for the future. If you want to know more about it, watch the video below.

    What do you do about feedback? What worked well in your company? Ever tried feedforward?

    Koen Schreurs
    Helping HR & Management to boost company culture & engagement

    The one secret most bosses never tell

    We find a job. We work hard. We receive a promotion. But despite our career, there is one truth almost all leaders keep quiet about. They find it too awkward to talk about. Even when it shouldn’t matter, most leaders never address the subject. They think they’ll lose face.

    What is this best kept secret?

    It’s this: we first became manager because we were getting results, not because we were deemed good at leading others. We have technical knowledge and know how to go about getting the work done. But we never experienced or learned what it means to lead, inspire or motivate others.

    It’s nothing to be ashamed of!

    It happens to the best. Take David Novak for instance. He’s the former CEO of Yum Brands. Yum Brands is a fast food company that employs around 90000 employees in 135 countries. David is a humble man who never saw himself as a leader. And he’s not an exception, since 87% of managers wish they had received more training when they first took on the role. For more insights on the modern management deficit, please read Good Manager, Bad Manager.

    It’s not new either

    It was already put forward by Dr. Laurence Peter in his 1969 book The Peter Principle.

    In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence.

    Even if Peter meant the book to be a satire, it was recently proved to be accurate. Early 2018, three professors from MIT and Yale wrote the paper Promotions and the Peter Principle. If companies only tried to promote the best potential managers, they should put less emphasis on current performance.

    Dr. Benson – one of the authors – was surprised. “I expected that the best salespeople would become merely-good managers. After all, some skills translate to management and others don’t,” he said. “To see that the best salespeople were becoming the worst sales managers was surprising.”

    Is it even a problem?

    Actually, I don’t think so. Granted, many managers are promoted out of their comfort zone or even competency at that moment. But with help, most people can become good leaders. I firmly believe leaders are bred, not born. And David Novak apparently believes this as well. After all, he switched careers and founded oGoLead to build better leaders. Be sure to check out his views on the power of recognition as well. It’s a good read.

    What can we do?

    Assuming the Peter Principle is a reality in at least some cases, those bad managers do have a very negative impact on business. Because bad leaders tend to inflict talent casualties. So what can we do about it?

    1. Being a top performer needs to carry more prestige.
    Managers get more attention from the top team, enjoy greater prestige and have more opportunities for personal growth or career advancement. One way of addressing this is the double or parallel career path where technical and management ladders are treated more equally.

    2. Decouple promotions to management from current performance.
    Evaluate potential managers on leadership skills. Look at soft skills. Allow people to take on temporary leadership roles, e.g. in a project context. This will help you understand their capabilities. And it also allows the employees themselves time to discover if a new role is right for them.

    3. If you’re newly promoted yourself, get humble fast.
    Realize yourself the skill set that got you promoted may not be the one you need to excel as a leader. See yourself becoming a great leader as a journey. If it isn’t offered to you, find a start-to-lead training program that helps you inspire, coach and motivate people. Perhaps a good start would be to take the time to talk to each new team member. be sure to ask questions such as “How can I best help you to excel?” and “How can I best show my appreciation for the good work you do?”.

    Koen Schreurs
    Helping HR & Management to boost company culture & engagement

    How to create a culture that performs

    how to create a culture that performs

    I recently came across the results of the 2017 study on organizational culture by Gartner. They researched how best to create a company culture that performs and drives ongoing business performance. It was an interesting read and I’d like to share the highlights with you.

    Gartner found that only 31% of HR leaders agree their organizations have the necessary culture to drive future business performance. Despite the fact that 80% of organizations currently actively manage culture.

    Three key gaps around company culture

    Their analysis revealed companies face three issues when trying to get employees to demonstrate the needed culture.

    1. Knowledge gap: employees lack awareness of the culture the organization needs (69% of organizations)
    2. Mind-set gap: employees do not believe in the culture the organization needs or don’t believe culture matters (87% of organizations)
    3. Behaviour gap: employees do not engage in behaviours related to the culture the organization needs (90% of organizations)

    They also found that closing one gap does not close all three. Only improving all three simultaneously had impact. Which is logical because you want employees to know it, believe it and do it!

    Three common challenges

    Gartner found the combination of knowledge, mind-set and behaviour to be powerful. Organizations with alignment between these factors achieve higher performance against revenue goals and hiring/retention targets, increased employee performance, and more positive public reputations.

    A further analysis revealed three common challenges, each of which affects knowledge, mind-set, and behaviour:

    1. Few organizations really understand their culture.
    2. Leaders aren’t driving the culture.
    3. Employees can’t operationalize the culture.

    To understand culture, use an employee-led diagnosis

    Typically companies do a periodic – often yearly or once every two years – survey on culture satisfaction and HR or business leader interpretation. But this approach falls short due to a too narrow focus on satisfaction, outdated information and easily misinterpreted data.

    To address these limitations, the best organizations are shifting to employee-led culture diagnosis by monitoring how employees experience the culture and involving employees directly in interpreting culture input.

    One organization shared that they moved from measuring culture once a year to asking employees daily culture questions as they logged into their workstations. The results are available to managers in real time as long as four people on their teams participate on a given day. Leaders then have the autonomy to decide how they will use the daily feedback, but based on Gartner’s research, they will now consider empowering employees to be the ones who take action.

    Make leaders drive culture by role modeling

    The research identified three key elements of effective leader role modeling:

    1. Say: what leaders communicate about culture (1% impact)
    2. Behave: how leaders personally demonstrate the culture (5% impact)
    3. Operate: how leaders manage business operations (e.g., budgets, processes, policies) in line with the culture (18% impact)

    The addition of the “operate” element, which goes beyond simply focusing on what leaders say and do, reveals why so few organizations see desired results from their investments in leader role modeling.

    78% of organizations rely on leader role modeling as a key component of their culture strategies

    Equip employees to apply culture in their day-to-day work

    Finally, organizations must help employees operationalize the culture day to day. We know organizations invest in a high volume and variety of culture communication, but that investment has failed to remove two employee-cited barriers to living the culture day to day:

    1. Translation barrier: employees struggle to translate the culture into the specific context of their day-to-day role.
    2. Tensions barrier: employees frequently encounter cultural tensions they don’t know how to address.

    Unsurprisingly, the number of employees who struggle with each of these barriers increases significantly as you move deeper into lower levels of organizations. If communication efforts haven’t addressed these challenges, what will?

    The best organizations remove the translation barrier by moving ownership of context-specific
    translation to employees themselves. An ideal way to accomplish this is to use a peer recognition system that empowers all employees to share examples of how to live the values and show appreciation for doing so.

    Removing the tensions barrier does not necessarily mean removing tensions but rather ensuring employees are equipped to manage tensions they encounter in their work. Organizations can ensure employees are equipped to do so by providing training. This way you can help employees deal with a typical tension like for instance between quality and speed of work.

    Do you want more tips on how to make your culture transformation succeed? Then be sure to read Culture transformation: 11 Lessons learned from 11 top consultancies.

    Koen Schreurs
    Helping HR & Management to boost company culture & engagement

    3 surprising tips on how to create more engaged & happy teams

    Engaged and happy teams at work… how do you do it?

    Until recently, I avoided pretty much any and every article attempting to address this question. Because I strongly believe happiness cannot – and should not – be a goal in and of itself. On top of that, I am convinced that merely having a bunch of happy employees walking down the hallways of your offices doesn’t necessarily equate having a successful company.

    Then, just the other day, I saw an interview with Dan Buettner, the National Geographic Fellow. This successful explorer, award-winning journalist and New York Times bestselling author travelled the world and discovered the 5 places on earth – dubbed Blue Zones – where people live the longest, healthiest lives, managing a vital lifestyle until well into their 80s, 90s or even 100s! And since health, vitality and happiness go hand in hand, Dan’s discovery of Blue Zones equally led him to learn a fascinating thing or two about happiness… to say the least!

    That is why this interview with Dan Buettner triggered me to write this blog: because I found his analysis of happiness surprisingly refreshing.

    But before I share with you his most valuable insights and tips, and translate them into work floor vocabulary for you, let me start off by asking you a question:

    Your goal (surely enough!) is to lead a genuinely happy life. Below, there are 3 descriptions of life styles you could possibly lead. If you were to pick the one that would most accurately reflect a genuinely happy life for you, which one would you go for?

    1. You choose to lead a life completely in line with your personal mission, a life that leaves you feeling satisfied. Your job truly reflects your personal values. You are happy, but don’t necessarily make loads of money.
    2. You choose a job that requires you to work very hard and do your utmost, day after day. You make money accordingly (that is to say: an awful lot!) and the likelihood that you retire with a huge sum in your bank account is very high.
    3. You choose to lead a life marked by fun and joyous times, in which personal contact plays an important role and you spend on average 6 to 7 hours a day with friends and family. In short, in principle not a day goes by without having enjoyed many intense moments of pleasure.

    – If you choose option 1, Dan advises you to live in Denmark.
    – If you choose option 2, then you are better off moving to Singapore.
    – If you choose option 3, Costa Rica is your place to be.

    The fact that these 3 different scenarios can make different people happy, goes to show that happiness is not a concept easily or simply defined: not everyone defines happiness in the same terms and, as such, happiness comes in many shapes and forms!

    For starters, 50% of happiness comes down to genetics, according to Dan. Every one of us is hormonally endowed with a certain capacity for happiness: on a scale of 1 to 10, people with more “happiness genes” will give themselves a 9 out of 10 if they are experiencing an utmost happy day, while people with less “happiness genes” will only give themselves a 6 out of 10 when they are experiencing their utmost happy day.

    This genetically determined range of happiness is more or less fixed, but that doesn’t change the fact that we are still left with another 50% which we can have an impact on with a view to maximise it! And when it comes to that remaining 50%, Dan draws a comparison between happiness and a cake recipe, for which you need several ingredients.

    From the results of Dan’s research, I extracted those 3 ingredients that to me seemed most important and relevant, especially in a professional business context: PLEASURE, PURPOSE and PRIDE!

    PLEASURE stands for your everyday positive emotions and experiences
    PURPOSE stands for your passion, your drive and your sense of meaning and connection
    PRIDE stands for your sense of satisfaction in the major areas of your life.

    These are 3 ingredients which you can influence and play with. And doing so will allow you to maximise your chances of successfully translating the secret of the “Blue Zones” into a happier and more engaged workforce!

    Let me tell you how…

    1. Create a pleasant working environment

    Dan says that “your environment, where you live or how you shape your surroundings, is the biggest, most important, and most impactful thing you can do to favour your own happiness”. His research has shown that people who live surrounded by nature, nearby water or in the mountains, tend to be a whole lot happier in life.

    And since any average employee easily spends 8, 9 or even 10 hours a day at work, the least we can do is apply those findings to our working environments! Because there too functioning in a pleasant environment is crucial: an environment that lets the sunshine in, one that energises you, with inspiring quotes and pictures on the walls, decorated with a little bit of in-house nature, in a building constructed with natural and sustainable materials, … these details might seem trivial at first, but they make a world of difference when it comes to the happiness levels of your employees!

    2. Work on a positive corporate culture

    People who feel connected with the values and mission of the organisation they work for are not only happier, but also far more engaged.

    That is why it is so tremendously important to recruit your people in function of those values and mission: an alignment here is priceless!

    And once that initial condition of having your values aligned is fulfilled, it is obviously just as important to imprint that PURPOSE that Dan refers to – that sense of meaning that is so vital to happiness – into the DNA of your people. Because the more people experience that feeling of completing meaningful tasks and positively contributing to the success of your organisation, the stronger they will feel connected and the happier they will be. Company values and messages merely decorating the walls of your headquarters without finding their way into the hearts of your employees are a complete waste of time, energy and resources.

    Find out how to successfully imprint the values and mission of your organisation into the DNA of your people here.

    3. Invest in social connection

    According to Dan, people who get to regularly experience face-to-face contact are by far happier than people who spend their days staring at computer screens. In Costa Rica (1 of the “Blue Zones”), for example, buildings and cities are constructed and planned in such a way as to stimulate and increase face-to-face contact between people… and with success, one would have to conclude!

    So, when it comes to company life, rely on social recognition to help people feel truly connected with each other, and create a positive and appreciative environment that facilitates this sense of connection! That way, you will automatically stimulate face-to-face contact between people and develop a working environment with positive people, who love each other, who believe in each other and who want the very best for each other. In short, a working environment in which friendships can flourish!

    Because nothing is more horrible than having to spend your days working in a toxic environment, in which jealousy and harassment prosper. And that kind of environment doesn’t only make people unhappy! In the long term, it most definitely makes them fall ill too…

    So now that you know the most important ingredients and know how to translate them successfully into a happier and more engaged workforce, you have no more excuse not to boost your company’s happiness levels! Create an environment in which people feel emotionally supported and safe, and are eager to come to work – day, after day, after day. In short: create your own Blue Zone!

    With a lot of PLEASURE, PURPOSE and PRIDE, we will be happy to help you on your way…

    Genuinely happy people do not just sit around being content. They make things happen. – Dan Buettner

    Nathalie Arteel
    Leading Angel Arteel Group
    Author of the book “Dare live life”

    More about Dan Buettner and his books.
    Do the True Happiness Test and find out how happy you really are.

    Why cultural change fails

    In the post on company culture problems, we identified five warnings signs for a culture that negatively impacts the company. But very often a toxic or broken culture is in fact a confused culture. A culture is confusing when employees receive conflicting messages. Sales guidelines are inconsistent with performance objectives. Leaders’ behaviour does not match with expected employee behaviour. Inconsistency breeds confusion.

    Culture change programs often focus on one or a few aspects of company culture.

    Ignoring alignment of all culture drivers is why most culture change fails. Initiatives that change only some cultural aspects either have no impact or – worse – have a negative impact by adding conflicting messages. Executive teams must look at the culture holistically and address all primary drivers that need alignment.

    But what are the main drivers of corporate culture? There are five drivers of company culture.

    1. Leadership and communication

    The way leaders define and communicate the company’s purpose and direction, influences whether employees will exemplify those values. Since actions speak louder than words, the most influential messages are broadcasted by the behaviour of leaders. They should walk the talk and act consistently with the values.

    2. Talent practices

    Organizations should hire, onboard, develop and engage employees aligned to the company values. Throughout the employee life cycle, organizations must be consistent on why someone gets hired, called a performer and receives a promotion.

    For example, advocating autonomy as a core value on your website and in your onboarding program, but allowing or even praising managers that micro-manage employees creates a confused culture.

    3. Work organization

    Structures, processes, teams and tools should support the desired culture. Most organizations base their operating structure on what worked in the past. They fail to see that organizing internal teams can greatly promote the desired culture. It can ensure that communication flows quickly and naturally, that ideas and responsibilities are shared between entities…

    For example, when you advocate a focus on customer service, but fail to organize in such a way that issues can be solved immediately, you put a customer first culture at risk.

    4. Shared values

    Core values should be the compass that guides employees in their daily actions. Common ways to interact with colleagues and client, set standards for expected behaviour. The issue is not so much that companies don’t have or communicate values, but more that they fail to link values to individuals’ daily work. Employees should believe in and apply the values in their work every day. They should live the values. Luckily there are powerful tools to help you achieve this.

    5. Praise for performance

    One of the most powerful influencers of human behaviour is recognition. All employees should be both held accountable for and receive praise for their efforts and results in supporting the company goals. All performance, reward and recognition management practices should be aligned with the values and the desired culture.

    Unfortunately, almost all research indicates that employees do not receive enough ongoing feedback, do not receive enough aligned incentives and do not receive enough recognition for their work.

    To change culture, you must pull the right levers within these five drivers.

    The best way to approach any culture transformation project is to assess all cultural drivers in your company and ensure the alignment of message they send to employees.

    How do YOU use the culture drivers to accelerate culture change? Drop me a line at koen@arteel.eu and I’ll be happy to share some further insights.

    Koen Schreurs
    Helping HR & Management to boost company culture & engagement

    Fabriqué avec par Arteel