How To Get Honest Feedback From Your Employees

One of the best and bravest ways to assess your effectiveness as a manager is by seeking feedback from the people who work for you.  The biggest challenge in achieving this is getting your team to be honest.  There is always a danger that people will tell you what you want to hear.  So, how can you do this?

Reassure Them

Tell your team that this is about your development as a manager and how you can best support them.  Your team have to be confident that they can provide some constructive observations without recrimination.  Some of these observations might be general awareness and for others it might be about how your management style affects them personally whether that’s positively or negatively.

Keep An Open Mind!

Now that you have asked for the honest feedback, be prepared to listen.  Remember we can often be blind to the way we appear to others.  This is an excellent opportunity to see how others perceive you so grab the chance to learn more about yourself.

Show Appreciation

Having secured the honest comments from people who work for you, show them that you are glad they have done so.  By doing this you will attract genuine respect.  It will also encourage them to give more feedback in the future.

Take Action!

The whole point of listening to your employees is to increase your self-awareness and then doing something with it.  When your team members see that you have not only taken in what they said but have acted upon it too, they will be really impressed.

Keep Doing It

Asking for feedback the first time is often the hardest.  Now that you have been through it and seen how useful it can be, keep it going and create a culture of openness and honesty.

Asking for feedback from your colleagues is a form of 360^o feedback and can be applied across a whole team or organisation.  Always ensure that it is set up as an opportunity to learn.  If you wish to apply it to the whole organisation it will normally be anonymous and can be very powerful.  If you wish to know more please contact us.

Many thanks

Mark Williams

Head of Training

MTD Training   | Image courtesy by Stuart Miles of FreeDigitalPhotos.Net