How to Give Tough Feedback Without Being Mean (+ a 4 step framework that actually works)
Only 5% of employees feel like their manager provides them with critical feedback, the feedback they need to grow
Welcome to Reframed!
Work is complex, career advice shouldn’t be.
I’m Ashley Rudolph and I write this newsletter for ambitious people who are ready to step into the next level of their careers. People have said that I share the kind of “real talk” that you only get from a close friend. Advice that feels actionable and helps improve their relationship to work.
If you’re nervous about giving constructive feedback, it means you care. But the data is clear: managers who lead with direct, honest feedback see high team engagement rates (78%). Here’s how to get there.
I’ve been thinking about how in many ways Reframed is about sharing some of the uncomfortable truths of leadership. And surprisingly, I’ve yet to cover giving tough feedback.
So today, we’re talking about one of the conversations almost every leader dreads. The one that makes your heart race and your palms a little damp before you click “Join Meeting” on Zoom 😬.
I’ve had to give more feedback more times than I can count. There were times when I was prepared and other times, where I stumbled my way through it. Whether my delivery was perfect or not, giving that constructive feedback was always the right thing to do.
Let’s look at a few of the times I’ve had to deliver hard feedback:
When people repeatedly submitted work with errors (grammatical errors, typos, lacked polish).
When someone on my team bypassed our reporting structure to undermine my leadership (yikes!).
When a direct report was too in the weeds of their team’s work and I needed them to be a more strategic contributor.
When another direct report escalated every non-urgent issue to me like a five-alarm fire. The escalations were starting to damage their reputation with cross-functional colleagues.
When a new team member wasn’t operating at their level, a fact their previous manager agreed with but did not have the opportunity to tell them directly, so I had to.
When someone repeatedly missed deadlines without warning and no plan in place for rectifying the issue of the work not being delivered and it being late.
Every single one of those times I was balancing a mixed bag of emotions. I was disappointed, frustrated, and apprehensive about approaching the situation head on. I knew giving feedback was the right thing to do, but I wanted to get it “right”. Sometimes I did, sometimes I didn’t.
And I’m sure many of you can relate to this….there were times when avoiding it felt like the safe choice. In those moments, here’s what I chose to do instead:
Avoid the issue or the person.
Do the work myself, because it was easier/quicker/less taxing.
Delegate the work to other members of my team who were capable of getting the task done.
Complain to friends.
Obsessed over giving “the perfect” feedback and, when I couldn’t arrive at the right talking points, deciding not to give it
When I took this route, the issues never improved. And more often than not, they snowballed. Avoiding the issue made me regret not addressing things sooner; even imperfectly.
CONTEXT
Why giving difficult feedback is tough for high achievers
I believe that most leaders want their team to be successful. Someone missing the mark can either feel frustrating (at best) and, at worst, like a personal failure.
If you’ve been there, you know the feeling: you delegate a project, you set a clear vision, and you outline the success criteria. In your mind, you’ve cleared a path for them to run towards the finish line.
But for one reason or another, they just don’t get there.
In my experience, the reason this situation feels so grueling for high achievers is twofold:
We are wired for systems. We expect to set the bar, establish the framework, and watch the team follow. When that doesn’t happen, it “breaks” our logic.
Some of us have a hard time understanding when others aren’t wired with the same “winning” mentality.
But the best leaders understand that managing is not a zero-sum game. People struggle to perform for many different reasons. They might have things going on in their lives that you’ll never know about. They may be in denial about the fact that they’re not cutting it and hoping you haven’t noticed. They might truly believe they are doing a good job.
DATA
And feedback, even the tough kind, is something that most employees crave. The research shows 72% of employees rated “managers providing critical feedback” as important for them in career development. And there’s a real benefit to giving feedback, leaders who rank in the top 10% at giving honest feedback create teams that rank in the top 23% of engagement. (HBR)
The reality is when you’re a good leader, empathy and accountability have to co-exist. In fact, if having tough conversations doesn’t impact you in the slightest…there’s probably something wrong with you (lol). You should feel the weight of it. Your discomfort is a sign of your humanity, not a weakness.
Some people will pull it together after receiving feedback and some just won’t. And that’s okay. It’s not your fault. You can provide the tools, the clarity, and the opportunity, but they have to own the outcome.
If they don’t, you haven’t failed as a leader; you’ve simply reached the limit of what your management can solve.
INSIGHTS
How to give difficult feedback, the human way
Here’s how I’ve learned to navigate giving hard feedback to my team members without being mean or letting my frustration get the best of me.
1. Investigate and gather your data. Don’t rely solely on your own perception or singular accounts from your team, especially if the performance issue is nuanced. To be fair to the person receiving it and to keep your own integrity in tact, you need facts. If you have the evidence (emails, missed deadlines, errors), organize it. If you don’t have clear firsthand data yet, you need to move the evidence from “subjective” to “indisputable” before you have a conversation. Try giving them a project to own from start to finish. Their ability to complete the work well and on time (or not) is a starting point.
2. Decide what kind of conversation you’re having. Before you have the conversation, define the scope. Are you talking to them about a specific issue or about a series of issues? Being clear on this will help you decide what conversation you’ll need to have:
Corrective feedback: This is point-in-time feedback about a single issue. If you just noticed the issue and you don’t have a full blown poor performance crisis yet, you’ll probably be starting here. Here’s a few of my favorite frameworks for delivering objective and direct feedback:
SBI (Situation-Behavior-Impact): This is a classic for a reason. Most feedback fails because it’s too vague (”You aren’t a team player”) or too judgmental (”You’re not trying”). SBI forces you to be clear and objective. You describe the scene (Situation), the action (Behavior), and the result (Impact). It is the most effective way to lower defensiveness because you aren’t attacking their character or them as individuals.
Situation: Be specific about the "where" and "when."
Behavior: Describe exactly what you saw (no assumptions).
Impact: Explain what happened because of that behavior.
Cumulative feedback/performance conversations: This is about addressing a pattern that has already been established. If it’s a pattern, don’t get distracted by the most recent mistake. Address the trend and share multiple examples.
3. Try not to debate or argue. This was the hardest part for me. There were times where I had done the work and gathered the evidence, but I let their pushback get to me. I felt the need to defend my stance and “prove” I was right. Don’t make the same mistake. Understand that hearing critical feedback triggers a “fight or flight” instinct. When you deliver negative feedback, the other person might get emotional, they may offer you valuable context that frames the situation, or they might try to throw you under the bus or rewrite history. The latter behavior is actually called switchtracking; where the other person flips the conversation and then starts giving you feedback on all the things you’ve done wrong. Your job is to stay controlled and point back to the facts. You aren’t there to win an argument; you’re there to state the reality of their performance. Keep the conversation fair.
4. Be honest about the downstream effects. There were times when I delivered feedback that was about more than the work being “bad.” It was about the cost to the culture on the team. Their performance (or demeanor) had a ripple effect that spread from my team to other departments. Being objective means showing them how their actions impact others.
MORE RESOURCES ON GIVING DIRECT FEEDBACK
And if you’re looking for more resources on giving constructive feedback, I recommend this incredibly thorough compilation from HBR.
CLOSING THOUGHTS
Addressing a performance gap or an issue at work is never going to be easy, and honestly, it shouldn’t be. If it makes you nervous, that means you still care. But I’ve had to learn the hard way that when I chose the "safe" route, staying silent, doing the work myself, or just venting to friends, I wasn't actually being kind to the other person. I was just protecting myself from an awkward 30-minute meeting.
The data actually backs this up. Gallup found that avoiding feedback altogether is the most expensive mistake a leader can make. When leaders give tough, corrective feedback, disengagement is roughly 22% (which means, these leaders have a 78% engagement rate!). But when leaders provide no feedback at all, disengagement climbs to 40%.
When we don’t speak up, we leave people to guess where they stand. You owe it to your team to be clear and you owe it to yourself to be the kind of leader who does the right thing, even when it’s hard.
If you have to deliver some feedback soon, good luck. See you on Thursday!
Ashley
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Show me a leader who's excellent at giving critical feedback, always has been, and insists it was effortless; and I'll show you a sociopath 😂
Really appreciate the nuance here about switchtracking. I've seen this happen so many times in tough conversations where suddenly the person recieving feedback starts pointing out everything that's been wrong with management or process. That redirection is such a natural defense mechanism but it totally derails the core issue at hand. The reminder to stay controlled and point back to facts is clutch, especially when emotions are running high.