Feeding Guidelines

This will be the summary of some feedback models you may want to try out when giving feedback. All of them are posted on the main page, too.

FEEDING GUIDELINES FROM MY LECTURER PROF. DR. BIRKENKRAHE:

Ways of getting/giving feedback:

1. the facts – raw information (“It is…”, “we saw…”)
2. emotional response (“I feel…”, “I think…”)
3. meta comment (“this means…”, “this could become…”)”

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FEEDBACK WITH NONVIOLENT COMMUNICATION:

Let me introduce you to the feedback model that contributed most to my own feedback-style. It’s actually not really a model, but more like a helpful structure to focus on when we want to be in a state of empathy and understanding. It’s based on self-compassion and enables me to clear my mind and understand myself before giving feedback. Developed by Dr. Marshall B. Rosenberg this way of giving feedback is now applied all over the world and his teachings of compassionate communication are the most effective tool I know to create Win-Win solutions. (Compassionate Communication is a synonym for Nonviolent Communication, or NVC.)

Positive Feedback (when your needs are met):

1. observation (the specific action that met a need of yours)
2. feelings (how do you feel when this need is met?)
3. fulfilled needs (which need has been met?)

1. Observation: the hardest part here is probably to separate observation from evaluation. Observation is the specific action we heard or saw – it’s only what a film-camera would have recorded (e.g. your friend invited you to five drinks). Evaluation is what we think about this action (“my friend was so generous”). The evaluation helps us to find out what we feel and need – but it is not part of the observation. That means, I prefer to say “I’ve seen you’ve washed all the dishes” instead of “You are so helpful”.

2. Feelings: Our feelings reveal wether an action meets our needs or not – if our needs are met (for example our need for support, understanding, appreciation, freedom etc.) we might feel happy, enthusiastic, energetic, thankful, etc .

3. Needs: Have you also learned to “have no needs” and to be a “people pleaser”? Then this step might challenge you a lot. Our needs are the precious base of all life and they are there to be nurtured. Right now, I have a need for clarity and therefore want to keep these explanations short – would you please refer to the needs-list to find out what needs mean in this case?

Developmental Feedback (when your needs are not met):

1. observation (the specific action that hasn´t met your needs)
2. feelings (how do you feel when this need is unmet?)
3. needs (which need do you want to meet?)
4. request (what can be done to have these needs met?)

1. Observation: When our needs are not being met, it can be quite difficult to view something like an “observing camera” would have recorded it, because when our needs are not met, a lot of judgmental thoughts come up. To stick to the camera view, I’d prefer to say “Yesterday’s dishes are still in the kitchen” instead of “you’re lazy”.

2. Feelings: when some of my needs aren’t met, I might feel tired, sad, lonely, exhausted, disappointed etc. These are all feelings. NVC helps us to be careful to differentiate between feelings and thoughts, as confusing them often creates even more conflict (for example the thought “I feel as if you don’t care” and the expression of my feelings “I feel lonely and sad” are very different.)

3. Needs: When I’ve acknowledged all my feelings, they will guide me to my unmet needs. My need might be for example for support, trust, appreciation, or to be understood. It often takes a moment to realize that I’m feeling lonely because I need some support, or that I´m feeling sad because I need appreciation, or that I´m feeling disappointed because I want to be able to trust that people stick to agreements.

4. Request: While a request is not necessary when we give positive feedback, it can be very useful when we give a negative/developmental one. A request focuses on what could be done to meet those needs that haven’t been met yet. Requests are specific (specific action) and in positive action language (what we want instead of what we don’t want). It’s not a demand – in NVC it’s important that we don’t want the other person to comply with our request out of fear, shame or guilt. We only want the other person to do as requested if the other person will do so freely.  Check out a little quiz on NVC requests at the New York Center for Nonviolent Communication

It might be easy to read about the steps outlined above, but to be able to actually follow them and use them to create helpful feedback takes a lot of practice – unless of course you grew up in a world without judgment.

This is just a “short” presentation of the model. These steps are based on, and supported by, a lot of background knowledge, but it would be too much for this post to go into that. However, it is this which makes the method so powerful. Just remember – this is not a method aimed at manipulating others, but a state of mind and a compassionate attitude towards life.

Was the explanation of the steps and ideas hard for you to follow, as it’s not clear to you what’s actually meant with all these words?

Example about how to apply these steps when preparing feedback

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I-MESSAGES

When it comes to feedback and communication, it’s often recommended sticking to “I-messages”: “I think… “,  “I feel…”,  “I find that….”,  “I need…”,  “I wish…”. Giving “I-messages” can be helpful when formulating our feedback in a way so that it does not judge the other person. For example, we could say ”I am a bit irritated because I wanted this document to be finished in this way…” Instead of “you didn’t finish the document in the correct way”. Another example would be “I would like more structure in our meetings and I think we could write an agenda and focus on that” instead of “these meetings waste my time, they are chaotic”.

To talk about ourselves, what we feel, need, wish or think, can help other people to understand us and to listen to what we have to say. In contrast, when we talk about other persons and judge them (“you are unorganised”), they will most likely hear that there was something wrong about them and defend themselves or attack back, and then it is often much more difficult to enable the other person to listen to what we wish to be done differently.

Let me “feed you” with an example of the difference it can make when I focus on “I-messages”. Imagine that you are one of my team members and our teamwork is highly frustrating for me at the moment:

1) “You know, to be honest, I can’t really work with you. When you are there, everything just seems messy and we get nothing done. I can’t see how you contribute to our process – you should learn to listen better, that’s important for teamwork.” (In this case, I am being honest, but I concentrate on telling you what I think about you and do not mention what is going on with me.)

2) “I am really frustrated at the moment because you mess up the whole working process – can’t you stick to the questions we are working on? I think you should be clearer and follow the agreed structure.” (In this case, I tell you how I feel but I mix this up with my judgments of your actions and an unspecific demand of what you should do. What I say still contains information about you, it’s not only about me.)

3) “When I asked the group to discuss the two questions I wanted clarified, you talked about other things. I feel frustrated now because I need structure and focus to be efficient. Would you like me to write down the points to be discussed on the flipchart in order to help us to keep our focus on them?” (Here, I try to tell you first the specific action I observed, then I tell you how I feel about it and which need of mine hasn’t been met by your actions. I also give a suggestion about how to solve this problem in a way that fits me and hopefully you too.)

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PREPARE A SANDWICH

The idea of feedback-sandwiches is well known in the United States and Great Britain. I would say that if a feedback-sandwich is meant in an honest way, it can contribute to the digestibility of my feedback, but I´m still not sure if it really helps. Check it out yourself:

One time there was a discussion in a coaching workshop about giving sandwich-feedback. Sandwiching means to “pack” a negative feedback between two positive feedbacks. Say I wanted to tell you that I am dissatisfied because something wasn´t done as agreed. Using sandwich-feedback, I would first tell you something positive, then the negative feedback, and finish off with something positive. For example:

“I´m glad that you made the effort to create this document. However, I am dissatisfied because we agreed that you did it with the other program. Still, thank you for finishing it on time.”

When we discussed using the feedback-sandwich at the workshop, we agreed that its use could be problematic, as people might learn that positive feedback is always accompanied with negative feedback. Also, when using positive feedback to dress up the negative one, people would realise this after a couple of times and wouldn’t trust any positive feedback anymore. Personally, I prefer to give positive feedback always when something contributes to my life, the life of others or a process, and keep developmental feedback separate. Nevertheless, for now, I will focus on the positive side of using a feedback-sandwich, which in my eyes is the awareness of how important it is that positive feedback is given at all.

SANDWICH PREPARATION:

1. Compliment
2. Critic
3. Compliment

You can also improve a feedback-sandwich, for example like this:

BEEF UP YOUR SANDWICH:

1. Behaviour (what the person has done)
2. Example (specific description about one action)
3. Effect (the effect this action has had on me, others or an outcome)
4. Future (suggestion about how it could be improved in the future)

Of course, you can also beef up your feedback without using the sandwich method.

If you would like to read more about feedback- sandwiches, this article could be of interest for you:
How to give a Feedback-Sandwich

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BIFF and BOOST

When something doesn´t go as you would like it, you can give BIFF-feedback (instead of a biff on the nose):

• B ehaviour (specific description of what the other person has done)
• I mpact (on me, others or an outcome)
• F eelings (how do you feel now?)
• F uture (how do you wish to improve this in the future?)

Another possibility to ”nurture” the world around you is the BOOST model:

• B alanced (focus on the points for development and on strengths)
• O bserved (base your feedback on what you have observed, rather than on what you think about it)
• O bjective (don’t refer to the personality but only on the actions and outcomes)
• S pecific (back up your comments with specific examples of the observed behavior)
• T imely (give your feedback as soon as possible after the activity)

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