optimus, Author at Optimus Performance

Using Positive Feedback To Motivate And Engage Employees

Sep 15, 2015 Comments

Positive feedback is one of the most powerful tools leaders and team members can use to motivate and engage employees and build strong team spirit. It does not cost anything to use other than effort and attentiveness to people’s performance.

In my previous articles and videos I covered the importance of feedback and how to give negative feedback. Feedback needs to be balanced between positive and negative to both motivate and guide employees and team members. If you regularly give positive feedback, people are more open to your negative feedback.

Make it Personal

Contrary to negative feedback, positive feedback needs to be personal. Rather than saying good job on that report, point out the attributes the person has applied to produce the result. That might sound like; that customer survey satisfaction report was well done and it shows your ability to focus in on critical data and discern what information is important to have for strategic decision-making. Great job!

Of course this takes more forethought than just saying good job on that report. But the benefits for the recipient is great. Giving feedback properly will reinforce the strengths of the person and how they are using their skills to contribute to the team and organization. This builds self-esteem and confidence and motivates the person to use these strengths even more because they know they are on the right track.

Make it Timely

The best time to give positive feedback is right away. If someone hits a homerun in baseball you congratulate them immediately. The same is true at work. When you see something worthy of praise or positive feedback let the person know then. The impact is much greater.

Make it Public

Positive feedback can be given within the ear shot of fellow employees. This further raises the person’s self-esteem. In contrast, negative feedback should always be given in private.

Make it a Habit

The biggest challenge to using positive feedback as a motivational tool is habit. If you are not giving positive feedback regularly you must develop the habit and this means doing it regularly until it becomes second nature. This requires conscious effort and at first may seem uncomfortable. Your initial attempts might feel forced but don’t let this stop you. Be genuine and the person will feel your sincerity and appreciate your effort.

Example

Here is an example video of giving positive feedback that I recorded with my assistant Sonia. Click on the image to watch.

Stephen Goldberg

Giving Negative Feedback for Improved Performance

Aug 22, 2015 Comments

A necessary part of leadership and teamwork is to give feedback to team members and direct reports. In my last article and video I gave an overview of using positive and negative feedback to engage and motivate employees.

In this article and video I’ll cover giving negative feedback with the goal of improving performance and productivity. When viewed from this perspective negative feedback can act as a coaching and training activity.

When

It is important to give negative feedback soon after the need for improvement is perceived. Of course this will vary according to the activity that’s taken place as sometimes you only see the results once the project is completed.

The longer you wait to give negative feedback, the harder it becomes and the worst off for both parties. So don’t procrastinate on this and make it timely.

Where

Give negative feedback in private. Sometimes people can be defensive when getting negative feedback and do not want to appear weak in front of their coworkers.

What

How does the result of the work differ from what you were expecting? This is what you want to focus on as that’s what’s important.

How

Start by giving positive feedback on what was done well. You want the person to continue using that skill or ability for the positive results.

Explain what you would have preferred for what needs to change. In this way you are redirecting their focus to the expected result and goal. Approaching the person in this way will have them be more open and less defensive to your feedback. This makes it easier to discuss what they need to do to produce better results. It may also help you determine where they may need additional support in order to achieve what you want.

Commitment

Through discussion figure out how the person will solve the problem and get a commitment of what they will do different to produce a better result. You can have this put in writing so there is an agreement and paper trail.

Support

Through your discussion of improvements there might be further training or coaching required or additional resources needed. Make sure you provide that and add that to your written agreement.

Example

Suppose someone is working on a media presentation for a sales meeting with potential customers. You want certain types of animation of graphic elements in some of the slides and the person did not deliver what you expected. Following my suggestions you would first start by telling the person what you like about what they’ve done. You could say I like the font you chose and the colour scheme of the overall project. It shows you have good judgment to make things aesthetically pleasing and comfortable for the viewer.

For the negative feedback portion you could say; I was expecting to have the graphics on slides four and seven animated to go along the text so they don’t appear all at once. We had discussed this so tell me what happened?

By providing the positive feedback first you are balancing both positive and negative feedback and keeping the person open-minded to receive your constructive criticism. As you can see from my example the negative feedback focuses on the expected results and the actual results strives to explore where the problem. This provides a greater platform for open communication and collaboration and keeps the person engaged and motivated.

In the following video I demonstrate how this is done with my associate Sonia.

Summary

make it timely
give negative feedback in private
start with the positives
focus on the results not the person
solve the problem and get commitments

In my next article and video I’ll cover giving positive feedback in more depth.

Stephen Goldberg

Using Feedback to Engage and Motivate Employees and Team Members

Aug 07, 2015 Comments

Feedback is one of the most powerful and underused forms of employee engagement and motivation. It is also extremely economical as there is no financial expense in using it and takes very little time.

Feedback is an essential motivational tool for leaders but also for team members to build team spirit and high performance teams.

Types of Feedback

Feedback needs to be both positive and negative. Positive feedback reinforces what the person is doing well and builds self-esteem, self-confidence and trust. It can be in the form of praise and recognition.

Negative feedback done well promotes continuous improvement and acts as a way of coaching and training employees and team members.

Balancing positive and negative feedback creates an emotional equilibrium. Think of this as a savings account. When you give positive feedback you are making a deposit in the person’s emotional bank account. Negative feedback is like making a withdrawal from the account.

Thus it is important to maintain a balance or preferably to give positive feedback more often. Doing this reinforces good performance, feels good, and improves engagement and team spirit.

How to Give Feedback

Positive feedback should focus on the behaviour of the person that led to the result. Negative feedback should focus on the result and what needs to be different.

In my last article and video I used the concept of “What If” as a way to give feedback. This approach combines positive feedback with suggestions for improvement and thus does not seem like criticism.

I’ll get into more detail on how to give feedback on future articles and videos so subscribe to my blog and videos.

When to give Feedback

Feedback on job performance should be continuous and ongoing.

Feedback should be given as soon the action deserving feedback has occurred. This makes both positive and negative feedback more powerful as a motivational force.

We see this all the time in sports. When a good jest occurs team members and the coaches are quick to reward or give direction.

The Goals and Obstacles to giving Feedback

As mentioned earlier feedback is one of the most underused forms of employee motivation, engagement and continuous improvement.

To become more frequent and adept at giving feedback, you need to make this a priority based on your understanding of its importance.

One good practice for leaders is to set up front expectations of job performance with milestones to achieve. When doing follow-up on tasks and projects the leader can identify actions worthy of praise and things that need improvement.

The same is applicable for teams. When teams have a common goal and understand each team member’s role, they can more easily praise each other and keep the team spirit high.

Think of the feedback a pilot gets continuously from the flight instruments when flying a plane. He knows instantly when the plane is going off course and makes adjustments accordingly. The same theory applies to employees. Your feedback lets people know if they are on track or need to adjust.

Conclusion

To keep employee engagement and motivation high:

Establish performance expectations
Develop the habit of giving feedback
Balance positive and negative feedback
Give feedback the right way
Adjust your feedback for the individual

Stephen Goldberg

Using What If for Continuous Improvement, Creativity and Better Team Collaboration

Jul 24, 2015 Comments

The term what if has been used by motivators and trainers to encourage people to challenge their beliefs and think of new ways of doing things.

I have been using this lately to spark creativity and better collaboration and teamwork. You can do the same whether you’re a leader or a team member working on a project. This approach works best when working on a specific project but it can also work to spark ideas to improve an existing situation or process.

How it works

When working on a project with a deliverable by one of your team members there is always specific tasks or milestones to achieve towards realizing the finished product. When someone presents their work for review and approval we either approve it or tell the person what we think should be different. Rather than saying what you want them to change, you could use the what if approach to suggest the change. It may sound like the same thing but there’s a subtle difference, which can have a powerful impact on the way the other person perceives your feedback. By saying what if you are not insinuating that what they have done is wrong, but rather suggesting a modification or alternative.

Ideally you would combine positive feedback with the what if. You would say what you like about what they’ve done and then use the what if to suggest what could be improved or changed.

Example

Suppose someone is working on a PowerPoint presentation that you’ve requested. They send you a draft of the presentation and there are certain things that you like but several that you don’t. The first step is to tell them what you like about their work and then you use the what if to suggest the changes you want.

For example if you like the template that was chosen you would point that out and why. You could say “your choice of template was well thought out as it really represents the image we want to project for this presentation”.

But let’s say there’s too much text and not enough images on some of the slides. You could say “what if you use powerful images to represent the points and reduced the text to a few words to complement the images?” You could continue to add more what if’s to suggest more of your ideas. Once you start with one what if more seem to flow easily.

Visualization

Somehow using what if generates images in the mind, not only for yourself but for the person receiving your ideas. This helps everyone get a better picture of what the outcome should look like.

Motivational approach

This type of approach is more motivating for everyone as it stimulates creativity and collaboration. Rather than receiving negative feedback and then being told what to do, using what if feels more creative and collaborative. And if you suggest that your team members use this approach as well you could bounce what if ideas off each other and come up with some really crazy concepts that just might work and make your project excel and standout.

Get going using this now and see what if!

Stephen Goldberg

Posts By: optimus