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How to correct a team member: avoid my damaging rookie mistakes

149 pointsby chrismdpabout 5 years ago

16 comments

matwoodabout 5 years ago
Some rules I follow:<p>- Correct in private, praise in public.<p>- Correction needs to be proportional to what happened.<p>- Employee level matters. For example, a manager should be gentler with a junior IC than a SVP.<p>- Always be direct and specific.<p>- Keep issues internal. Customers should only see a united front, that also takes ownership of problems.<p>- Think it through, don&#x27;t correct while being emotional.
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sequoiaabout 5 years ago
One major point I&#x27;d add in giving corrective feedback and coaching teammates or subordinates away from &quot;bad behaviors&quot; is &quot;Rome was not built in a day.&quot; Don&#x27;t try to correct or address everything all at once. Rare is the person who can hear five criticisms of their behavior all at once and make productive use of the feedback rather than becoming defensive.<p>Effectively influencing people&#x27;s behavior while maintaining trust takes time. If someone is doing 3 things you don&#x27;t like, pick the one you want to address in the next 2-6 weeks, and let the other ones slide for the time being. If you&#x27;re building long-term relationships, there will be more time, and as you build trust giving (and receiving) feedback becomes easier for all parties.<p>Urgency is the enemy in this situation.
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torstenvlabout 5 years ago
None of this. Correct a deficiency immediately but casually if that&#x27;s what&#x27;s appropriate for the severity.<p>&quot;Asking to understand&quot; is toxic and passive-aggressive. I have a hard time imagining a worse management technique than to put someone on the defensive without even telling them what the conversation is about. This is the opposite of openness and transparency and it is what is killing work culture.
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_y5hnabout 5 years ago
I&#x27;ve had former manager &quot;correct&quot; my openness to external partners. In those few cases, they never questioned why I had an open exchange, what I get from such or any explanation of benefits from closing down communication. Feedback and judgement may come from wrong or misunderstood context, so sometimes, someone might later admit a different approach was prudent.<p>Professional behaviour doesn&#x27;t necessarily mean being a dick or hoarding information. In my book, this is playing the organization worse off. You yourself might be better off, to the detriment of everyone else around you. This I view as unprofessional, becoming of some external consultants, not regular employees in a supportive organization.<p>Feedback should not name people. You might name roles or groups instead, preferably just state events as they factually happened, without pointing blame or fingers. What happened happened, and now we deal with that. Just assume people are learning on the job. Some people take things too hard by default, so instead reassure them the company is coping as a business.<p>Sometimes, information is illegal to share, or when personal or too much detail, it is oversharing. But in general, sharing information is a safety net. People work better and do better, when provided enough context to thrive. To know the difference, you must put yourself in other people&#x27;s roles, what they should know and not. If you overshare technical details, some people will become uneasy, so you share what they are comfortable knowing. Some people abuse information, so they need less information to abuse.<p>To &quot;correct&quot; someone, first make sure you know their intentions and why they did as they did. It&#x27;s not about being right or wrong always. Treat people as you&#x27;d want to be respected. Assume that, given new information, people continually learn or casually, mention good learning resources. Your best efforts won&#x27;t make others learn. The best teachers let other people draw their own conclusions.<p>Empathy
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bengaleabout 5 years ago
I&#x27;d love to know what he put in that email to cause a problem that lasted a whole year. A simple &quot;The tone of that email comes across off to me, remember the good nature in humour can be lost in text communications.&quot; Seems like a simple enough follow up.<p>I think with managing people its best to be direct but proportionate. As long as your reports know that they can take it up with you if they need clarification or don&#x27;t agree you should be fine.
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lmilcinabout 5 years ago
So here&#x27;s the hard way:<p>Ensure people understand, in general, that when you are correcting them you are doing it for a good reason and that it is always intended to help the other person AND the team.<p>Ensure people understand you are always asking for the same treatment. Make a point to regularly show you follow up on constructive criticism.<p>Don&#x27;t be too serious when giving criticism. The only time to be serious is when the offense is grave and career ending, you are his&#x2F;hers superior, and even then only maybe.<p>Never give criticism without honestly complimenting for something else.<p>Never give criticism without honestly giving reasons why you think it was necessary <i>and</i> in the best interest of the person you give criticism to.<p>Never give criticism without seriously considering the point of view of the person you plan to give criticism to.<p>Never give criticism immediately. The times you avoid mistakes when giving criticism will make up for the fact you need to exercise your willpower to wait. If you can&#x27;t do that, you are probably not a good person to give criticism anyway.
stepbeekabout 5 years ago
I winced reading this.<p>I normally write down what I think needs some feedback then leave it until the next weekly 1:1. I think sleeping on something like this leaves me in a much better state to deal with in a reasonable way.
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alex_youngabout 5 years ago
I&#x27;m impressed that the title of this post points to a better way of delivering feedback than is discussed in the article.<p>This event sounds like a wonderful opportunity to have a 1:1 conversation with the person and tell a story to help them grow.<p>Before talking to your team member, set your own tone internally. This conversation should be friendly, helpful, and constructive. No one should walk away feeling bad about things, but instead leave having strengthened your alignment and hopefully learned something in the process.<p>First, ask them how they think the message they sent was received. Be open to learning new things, such as an intent that wasn&#x27;t clear to you, or some other details about the interaction that aren&#x27;t immediately obvious to you. Also be open to and prepared for them to already know there was a problem with it. Paraphrase it back to them if you don&#x27;t understand something they said.<p>Next, talk through a similar story from your past where you sent a message with similar problems. It doesn&#x27;t have to be an email, but it&#x27;s important for you to talk through how you made a similar error. The key is how you identified the problem and identified a better way to handle things in the future.<p>If you honestly and thoughtfully have this conversation with your valuable team member, you will develop empathy and trust that will not only help them learn from the experience, but give both of you a better working relationship for the future.
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zoomablemindabout 5 years ago
&gt; ...one of my team copied me in to his email reply to an external contact<p>&gt; ... I decided to reprimand him for his email<p>It&#x27;s not clear from the post what&#x27;s the status differential of the involved. Is the author a manager, mentor or superior to the team member mentioned?<p>If there&#x27;s not much of the differential, then taking such a formal approach (company emails are records!) is indeed an odd way to react to this. After all, the assessment of the &quot;tone&quot; is a judgement call.<p>If author was a superior by rank, then it&#x27;s a matter of upholding the internal policies, which should not start with a &quot;reprimand&quot; but communicating the policies, giving training, helping to adopt it. This process can as well be delegated to avoid direct confrontation and unnecessary tension and guilt. Putting someone in a hot seat to &quot;help me understand&quot; is something from Great Inquisitor&#x27;s playbook.<p>Didn&#x27;t someone assign that less experienced team member to deal with the reply to the external contact? Let _that_ person deal with the fallout accordingly.
lackerabout 5 years ago
It really depends on who you’re talking to.<p>If you are giving feedback to an experienced, emotionally mature coworker who trusts your judgment and knows you respect them, you can just concisely tell them what you mistake you think they made, and leave it at that.<p>If you are giving feedback to a recent graduate who has a lot of raw talent but is inexperienced, still working to improve their own self-confidence, and doesn’t know you very well yet, then it is wise to take the time to communicate very clearly. That means not making them think something is an enormous problem, when actually it is only a small problem.<p>Some people will have teams of only one of these types of people and think “h the right way to handle this is X” but in my experience it is situational and different people work better with different types of communication.
nikk1about 5 years ago
I think it is always a good idea to reflect on your relationships and how you communicate with your teammates. Like the article says, communication is tricky. &quot;We must strive to ensure what we say actually goes in, is understood, and elicits change.&quot; Giving critical feedback is something that is very difficult to do right, which is why the author suggests to avoid it when possible. Also, we all underestimate the value of (well-done) positive feedback. There is a lot of untapped potential in positive feedback. It is the best way to bring out the best in your teammates, since they will continue to focus on their strengths.
KKKKkkkk1about 5 years ago
What do you do about a peer who blatantly and publicly violates company policies? For example, someone who uploads a secret company document on GitHub so that it&#x27;s easier for them to work from home. And then they share that document with you and ask you questions about it. On the one hand, you can be a dick about it (i.e., do the right thing and confront them) and pay a personal price. Alternatively, you can let it slide, pretend that nothing happened, and risk an escalation of inappropriate behavior in the future.
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JoeAltmaierabout 5 years ago
Something called &#x27;non-violent communications&#x27; might be in order. Start with an observation - &quot;You show up to standup 5 minutes late&quot;. Then a personal reaction - &quot;I&#x27;m frustrated&quot;. Third, the goal - &quot;I want our group to move forward efficiently&quot;. Finally, the &#x27;ask&#x27; - &quot;Can you show up on time for each standup?&quot;
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5cott0about 5 years ago
How to correct a team member? Hold yourself accountable for your own mistakes first.
ideal_stingrayabout 5 years ago
How can I express a preference to have my managers discuss my mistakes over email, instead of by “gently pulling me aside” and talking in person? I am more comfortable expressing myself in non-real-time text format, especially with topics that feel hurtful. A paragraphs-long, detailed email explanation would be the best way for me to receive feedback!
Antoninusabout 5 years ago
I have a few rules. Be nice and be exceptional at your job.