Getting Feedback

While I have been pulled back into my old assignment, I went ahead and talked to a few people to get input regarding feedback.

One of the areas that I had questions was how managers wanted to keep a tab on the people below them. Like most questions, there wasn’t any one specific answer. I found the best advice was to read how your manager operates, but I did find some general helpful tips.

Before people know how you operate and your capabilities, it is best to keep the person in the loop as often as possible. This requires frequent updates and possible guidance.

1. As the manager gains more trust from observing your work and your deliveries, usually, they give you more independence and there is a less need to constantly keep the person in a direct report situation.
2. Over-communication is always better than under-communication. Most people know how to ignore the less important information. Also, by over-communicating, you give yourself some fall back space.
3. Be constant on how you communicate. Communicating doesn’t mean telling your supervisor every single detail of your project or problem. Like the work consultants perform, choose and synthesize the information you communicate.

The other important aspect in seeking feedback is having the feedback, especially good feedback, written down. Written feedbacks have two benefits.

1. During performance reviews, it provides concrete evidence necessary to give you the boost (assuming the feedback was good) that you need to move up.
2. People move on, retire, or quit. Written feedback keeps the information in your file for future review.
3. Written feedback forces the evaluator to spend some time actually thinking over the issue. It often results in more detail and specific feedback.
4. Make sure the feedback is both positive and negative. That way, you have areas you can work towards on your next project.

With those goals in mind, I’m going to send out a feedback request once I “officially” role of this project.