Good feedback should not come as an annual surprise. If employees only find out during their annual appraisal what has been going well (or not) for months, a great deal of potential for development remains untapped. A genuine feedback culture does not arise from a single date in the calendar. It is evident in how naturally feedback takes place in day-to-day working life.

Three things make a crucial difference here:

1. Give feedback regularly
Brief check-ins, one-to-one meetings or debriefing sessions after projects create opportunities for discussion before issues pile up over months.

2. Make feedback specific
Generalised assessments such as ‘That wasn’t ideal’ offer little guidance. It is more helpful to identify specific behaviour, describe its impact and formulate a suggestion for the future. The WWW method provides a simple framework for this.

3. Enable two-way feedback
A feedback culture also means that managers actively seek feedback and demonstrate that critical feedback is welcome. After all, openness only arises where people can trust that honest feedback will not be used against them.

The aim, therefore, is not to give as much feedback as possible, but to structure feedback in such a way that it is timely, specific, appreciative and development-oriented. .
Then the annual meeting will not be a moment of surprises, but what it is actually meant to be: a joint review of development, goals and the next steps.

At hrdiamonds, we support managers and teams in strengthening precisely these skills – through coaching and taylored training programmes focused on feedback and leadership.

Want to strengthen your feedback culture? We’d be happy to provide a free, no-obligation offer: marketing@hrdiamonds.com