Share Me That Information

We all receive some sort of feedback in our lives, on or off the job, everyday. How we receive it, however is an extremely important adaptive skill; our success at this skill seems to be linked to our past experiences. If such an experience was painful or humiliating for us in the past, we are likely to resent receiving feedback. In contrast, if we felt a certain amount of acceptance along with criticism in the past, we will tend to be less anxious and defensive about the process. It’s through feedback that we can “see ourselves as others see us.”

Feedback is the lifeblood of performance in the workplace. According to research, providing feedback is an effective way to motivate employees to learn in training and increase the effectiveness of goal setting. With some tasks feedback occurs naturally. For example, in baseball, a batter receives feedback on his swing by seeing how hard and far the ball travels. For other tasks, however, judging the correctness of a behavior without feedback is difficult. For example, you complete a project for you boss and he grunts at you or worse yet, never comments on the quality of the project, leaving you to wonder if you are meeting the company’s expectations. Feedback is so important that it can have a profound positive effect on job satisfaction and reduce turnover.

A final consideration for feedback concerns what type to give. Research and common sense agree that positive feedback should be given when tasks are performed correctly. Praise provides an incentive to continue correct behavior. To be most effective, negative feedback should be delivered by focusing on the behavior and should be accompanied by specific suggestions for how the individual can improve performance.

Because of the importance of feedback in the workplace, the process is likely to have some psychological and emotional effects on the person receiving the feedback. A balance must be maintained between giving too little and too much feedback. An individual will not learn if too little feedback is given. However, too much or overly detailed feedback causes frustration, slowing down the learning process.

Feedback is constructive when it is given with the goal of encouraging and reinforcing positive behavior. For feedback to be effective, it must be given when individuals do things properly, not just when they make mistakes. Here are some tips for effective feedback.

- Identify the behavior and focus on it rather than the person’s personality. For example, if someone is often late for work, you might say, “In the past two weeks you have been late 6 times” rather than “We are tired of your lack of responsibility and commitment to your job.”

- Explain how the behavior is impacting others. For example, “When you arrive 10 minutes late, customers get angry because there is no one to help them. When other employees cover for you, it causes them to get behind on their work, resulting in them missing part of their lunch break or being forced to work overtime.”

- Ask the individual for suggestions on how the behavior can be changed.

- After arriving at a solution, together you should set a specific goal. For example, they could agree that the employee be on time everyday for the next week.

- After an agreed upon time, the two of you should meet to see if the goal has been met and to set new goals.

The basic question is what to do with the feedback we receive. Some people deflect it, deny it, explain it away, or in some other way try to protect themselves from the potential impact of the feedback they receive. One’s personal goal ought to be focused on developing the capacity to stay open to feedback especially, during those moments when you are feeling defensive about the feedback. The defensiveness is a clue that you are about to learn something very important about yourself.

A person who is highly practiced in this skill will frequently solicit feedback from supervisors and work colleagues as a way to learn from mistakes and to make changes.

Copyright 2007 Michelle P Simms, personal development coach. My ideal client is not defined by a specific profession, but by the passion they have to grow personally and professionally. Michelle leads weekly teleseminars on emotional intelligence topics. Find her at http://www.SimmsInternational.com

Throughout time, the greatest orators and teachers have illuminated their lessons by telling powerful stories. Story-telling is a great way to engage your audience and show them how your topic, point or lesson relates to them specifically. Unfortunately, not everyone is born a great story-teller, and some stories are better than others. Follow these 7 steps to deliver great stories every time!

1. Know your audience and make sure your story is appropriate

When telling stories it is really important to know who you are telling them to and have an idea of how they might react to them. Age group, professional level and culture are extremely important factors; make sure your story is appropriate for your audience. Even when you are telling a “tried and true” story, what might be appropriate and funny for one group, could be distasteful and unacceptable for another. Take care when choosing the topic of your story and the language you use to deliver it.

2. Make your story easy to relate to

The topics of stories should be broad enough that anyone can relate to them. This tactic is also used in stand-up comedy. The funniest comedians take every-day situations that everyone experiences and make light of them. This is what a good story does. It has a plot that everyone can relate to, a subject that is simple, straight-forward and illustrative of the lesson. If you’ve chosen the right story and delivered it correctly, you will actually see the light bulbs going off above your listeners’ heads. If you have to say, “I guess you had to be there,” you have not told a clear and effective story!

3. Write out your story when presenting for the first time - and cut it in half

I have seen way too many speakers go on and on about things where I just want to stand up and yell, “Can you make this long story short?” When you plan to tell a story for the first time, write it out the way you want to present it - and then cut it in half. Remember the KISS philosophy: Keep it Short and Simple. Give us the nuts and bolts and nothing else. Sometimes story-tellers get wrapped up in the details, usually because they experienced the situation and find those details relevant. But usually the details of what you were wearing at the time and where you bought that outfit are not adding to the lesson or plot of the story.

4. Have a clear link between your story and your lesson

A story is only worth telling if it has an obvious link to the subject being taught. We all know from common conversation how annoying it is to listen to someone’s long-winded story just to wonder at the end of it why it was shared. Effective speakers have a very clear link between the moral of their stories and the topic at hand. If this link is missing, the story is useless, and your listeners are left wondering what it was for.

5. Engage your listener by engaging the senses

A good story-teller engages all of our senses. We might listen to you tell a funny story about ice cream, and that will be enjoyable, but what if you could make us taste that ice cream, feel its creamy consistency on our tongues, visualize the mess that’s made all over your face as a child, and so on. That’s what will make your story great and memorable.

6. Be aware of audience cues when telling your story

As a speaker you should always be aware of audience response. The attentive speaker will always know when the audience is losing interest and make appropriate changes to the delivery of the story, the language being used, the topic or even the final moral or punch-line. Different audiences won’t always react to the same story the same way. No matter how well you do your homework, you can still run into problems. Be flexible and have a back-up plan if your story isn’t going as well as planned.

7. Deliver your story with some feeling!

The key to an amazing story is in its delivery. A passionate story teller will get a much more enthusiastic response from the listeners than a boring one! Use variations in pitch, volume and intonation to make the story interesting to listen to. Be sure to pause at the right times for dramatic effect, and pull the audience in with mystique and excitement.

Heather Hansen, founder of Singapore-based Hansen Speech & Language Training, is an executive speech and language coach, writer and trainer. Become a star speaker! Visit her website www.hansenslt.com now for free information on how to speak clearly, correctly and confidently! Join her mailing list to receive your free special report, and as a special bonus you’ll also receive her monthly newsletter, Speak like a Star!