Giving Feedback

Imagine that you facilitate a weekly meeting. The group is new but has begun to gather momentum and gel. At a critical meeting a member who had been absent returns and insists on the group stepping back and revisiting many decisions that had been made in his absence. You use all the skills you have but still leave feeling that the success of the group has been sabotaged.

This is a case where a facilitator must give feedback –clear, thoughtful, factual and respectful, but unadorned. It may be helpful to state your intention in giving the feedback (perhaps to help the team succeed or become more efficient). In giving this feedback being factual is critical. You would not use the word sabotaged, for example because that is your interruption of a certain action. Describing the action and the impact it had on the group is what is least likely to make the receiver defensive, although they may become defensive anyway. Many of us try to avoid giving direct feedback in circumstances like this, but in the long run it is more troublesome to avoid it.

Feedback is often followed by a questions (such as “did you realize that” … or, “how did you feel about that”) or a proposal (“such as let me suggest you try limiting yourself to only one comment every half-hour during team meetings”… or “would it help if you made notes to yourself instead of interrupting others?”)

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