Feedback series part 2: Build a habit of asking for feedback
Welcome back to the feedback series! In the previous posts, I talked about feedback as a concept and asking for 360 feedback, and in this one, we’ll look into different ways of asking for feedback early and often.
A request for 360 feedback often happens once or twice a year, often connected to your development talk or performance review. Of course you don’t have to — and you definitely shouldn’t! — wait for those events in order to ask for feedback. Instead, I recommend you to build a habit of asking for feedback way more often than that.
There’s a parallel to draw between feedback and XP practices, especially continuous integration. I hope it’s not too far fetched. Big integrations are cumbersome and typically take a lot of time and energy; the same goes for feedback; whether you want to implement a suggestion from someone’s feedback and adjust your behavior, or you want to craft valuable feedback in response to a colleague’s feedback request. So, much like we want to move towards smaller pull requests and integrating more often, we want to move towards smaller feedback requests, at a higher cadence.
Think of asking for feedback as gathering small bits and pieces of information ever so often. It does not have to be feedback in written form; it could be asking a colleague what they thought of the presentation you just did, or what they think of your approach to solve a technical problem, or if they have any input on a meeting you facilitated, or a document you drafted, etc. The important thing is to regularly pull for feedback from your colleagues, so that you get a better understanding of how they interpret you and your actions.
So, how do you best do that? Especially if this isn’t what you typically do it can be kind of hard to get started. I like to divide it into two different types; one is asking for feedback on things you do, and the other is asking for feedback on your behaviors. Here are some ways I’ve gone about it.
Get feedback on events or artifacts
I really recommend this approach if you want to improve your skills or the output of your work. Getting a colleague’s perspective on what you do will provide you with a lot of helpful input. The more you do this, the more you’ll also understand who of your colleagues are typically good at giving feedback. Pick a colleague whose opinion you trust and ask them to take a look at what you’ve done. You can use this quite broadly, covering anything from the code you write, to the systems you design, to the meetings you facilitate or the roadmaps, presentations or documents you produce.
When I was an agile coach, I would sometimes invite another agile coach to a workshop or retrospective that I was going to facilitate. I asked them to join as an observer and provide me feedback afterwards. How well did my format fit the needs of the team? What did they think of my ability to facilitate? Did I manage to include everyone? How did I manage time? What could I have done differently? etc. Although this could feel kind of scary at times, it was an incredible way of getting feedback on one of the key aspects of my role.
Get feedback on a pattern
If you’re trying to change a behavioral pattern of yours; for example your communication style or your choice of words, that often means you’re trying to change something that you’re likely doing without really thinking about it. It can be super helpful to have someone be on the lookout for the thing you want to change, someone who is willing to give you feedback on how well you’re managing to change this pattern.
So, first find an ally in a colleague you trust and ask them if they’re willing to help you out. Then figure out how you want to go about it; what should they look for? How and when do you want the feedback?
An example of this was when a colleague of mine wanted to change their language to be more inclusive; they wanted to move away from saying “Hey guys” to something that would speak to everyone. Their ambition was to replace guys with something else, like folks, team, friends, all, etc. Of course I agreed to help out. Whenever we were in the same meeting, or whenever they communicated something on Slack, I’d be watching out for the small successes and failures in their efforts to make this change. I’d let them know afterwards; “Nice work, not a single one!” and we developed kind of a quiet feedback loop between the two of us, where I could nudge them in real time if they used the word “guys” and they would correct themselves.
Get feedback from your manager
On the topic of building a habit to pull for feedback often, I would also recommend you to regularly ask your manager for feedback. Are you living up to their expectations? What do they think of your performance? What can you do to improve? Is it something that you’re doing that they want you to do more or less of? Are they satisfied with your level of transparency? Have they gotten feedback about you from someone else, that they can share with you? etc.
Hopefully you have regular meetings with your manager, where feedback is covered, but if not, see if you can set something up. Don’t wait with getting this feedback from them. In all honesty, they should be able to give you valuable input to help you grow.
Have you tried something similar? How did it go? What’s your best advice to build a habit of asking for feedback?
