Radical Candor: How is Feedback Culture Central to Success?
We believe in the power of telling the truth sincerely from day one!
This is the best way to summarize my time at Trendyol after nearly two years. As a leading technology company in the rapidly changing e-commerce sector, we rely on our team as we run towards our common goal in the “One Dream One Team” spirit.
What we trust is our team, but how does our team trust each other? In this article, I will explain the way we foster the feedback culture at Trendyol and how we aim to strengthen it at every opportunity.
Main Philosophy and Guide
The book Radical Candor, written by Kim Scott, expresses our mindset as Trendyol. It is perfect for teams that understand and apply the basic philosophy of feedback culture to communicate more sincerely and openly. The logic is simple, as the chart demonstrates, but things that seem simple and easy are often difficult in practice, particularly in the business world where there are plenty of parameters. You can use this book to guide you in what to do and how you can change behavior for yourself, peers, leaders. We do, and it really works. For more details about this book and mindset check the website.
How do we use this mindset in our daily flow?
Understanding why we provide feedback is important in that it motivates us to improve, that’s why I personally try to improve myself in this matter: we have a goal and we should recognise our powerful points and appreciate each other’s as well as the aim of the culture. We should aim to act in accordance with the Challenge Directly and Care Personally axis. We should be able to say that we can improve in this particular area, likewise for the points that we are good at, and we should recognise and support the strengths of our team while also speaking up to show our appreciation of their work.
Knowing why we give feedback has the power to change our perspective: we have a common goal, we run as a whole team. If there is a point that hinders or slows us down, let us identify and eliminate it. If there is something we thrive at, let’s be aware of it and improve. It is important to remember that feedback is also an acknowledgement.
I find this directly related to another aspect that I love at Trendyol: raise the bar. In order to raise the bar in our team’s way of working, we must also have the courage to talk about our areas of development without offending others. I see this as a responsibility to my teammates; it is not easy to have the determination to tell the truth.
I am aware that these things are easier in theory. I would like to address how we practice it and make it one of the cornerstones of our culture
- We have structured feedback training sessions, thanks to our great L&D Team, here are some examples:
- Feedback session for our Trendyol Onboarding Program for the new joiners.
- Feedback 101 training for every member who joins Trendyol.
- Radical Candor’s e-learning content in our online training platform for everybody.
- Mandatory practical training sessions for our leaders for Radical Candor mindset. (6 workshop sessions)
- We organize feedback workshops (Feedback Practice Club): We start from the basics like how would you give feedback to the other person if you were in X case. Practice makes perfect, always.
- In principle, we prefer to give face-to-face feedback (Zoom is also okay). In written communication, sometimes we can’t express ourselves clearly.
- We avoid giving hurtful or personal feedback about the person’s character.
- We take care to give feedback in the context of Situation-Behavior-Impact-Action within ASAP (depends on the content)
We normalize giving and receiving feedback. - We are responsible for following up the feedback for improvement areas: For example, let’s say we gave feedback on time management, we should follow up and inform each other whether or not we observed an improvement. This is especially significant for the leaders.
- We do not limit feedback to situations related to our areas of improvement; Appreciation is also feedback.
- It is valuable to practice regular 1–1s with our team leaders.
- We train our leaders for performance evaluation so that they can give clear and data-based feedback for a given timeframe.
- We provide training on the use of retrospective culture by teams and retro meetings during our projects. I think the two issues feed off each other.
- Our Trendyol Communication training is also effective for this culture, both for internal and external communication.
The points mentioned above are summarized as follows in Radical Candor, it is useful to share, I think it is catchy.
“Keep Your Feedback HIP
Humble → Modest
Helpful → For helping
Immediate → Instant
In person → Personal
In Private → One-on-one
Not about Personality→ About situation/behavior, not about personality”
This culture — Trendyol culture-really has an interesting and uplifting effect. After a while, you start to apply it to your personal life and it increases the quality of your relationships. Or, you can find yourself giving feedback to your dentist in a simple way for your long treatment process :)) Because when I explain what we have done both in the book and at Trendyol, everyone will understand what is at the heart: open communication. I think that an open and sincere communication will serve iteration in all areas in your life. Raise the bar, retrospective, feedback workshops… It’s all about telling the truth by communicating openly and respectfully.
We know that leadership, team management, career development, and running towards a common goal are all about communication. So, let’s take a step and consider what we can change for open communication-feedback.
It might be a great starting point to read Radical Candor :)
You can check current positions from here and read more about us from here 🙂
Happy reading!
