Archive for June, 2009
The Power of Feedback
Sunday, June 14th, 2009Last month I voluntarily participated in a 360 degree feedback assessment – my first. I invited seven people to serve as feedback partners (FBPs): my boss and Dean of the school where I work, 2 colleagues/peers, a senior member of the business school staff, my best friend and long-time co-author, a senior colleague and mentor from another university, and my husband. An eclectic bunch to be sure, but I selected each one because of the depth and quality of the relationships and because I knew each would be extraordinarily candid in their responses to the interviewers questions about my strength, challenges, and areas for improvement. And candid they were! In fact, one of my FBPs told me after her interview that she would never voluntarily put herself through this process. When I asked why her response was, “I couldn’t take the criticism.” As you can imagine, whatever anxiety I had initially about the feedback was heightened after her comment. I thought to myself, “well what on earth did you say about me?” Naively, I was not fully expecting that “criticism” would be synonymous with “feedback.” Nevertheless, receiving the feedback has proven to be tremendously worthwhile as I learned to see myself as others perceive me. At the end of the day, although it was not a painless process, I view the feedback as a gift of sorts;. and it has caused me to reflect on two important areas: 1) what motivates me, and 2) the impact that my actions have on my interactions with others.
A leader’s motivations and the impact of his or her behavior have tremendous significance to one’s followers. (more…)