97 Things Every Engineering Manager Should Know

Chapter 15. Delivering Feedback

Jennifer Dyni

Delivering feedback—a valuable skill for any team member—is one of those things that has not come naturally to me.

I started my career thinking that all it took to be good at sharing appreciations or criticisms was to simply state my perspective out loud. (I’m from Jersey: direct is good.) As it turns out, literally spewing out my thoughts and ideas didn’t always go very well—or at least not the way I expected it to. My attempts to help influence up, down, and sideways were rarely sunshine and daisies and much more often eye rolls and terse “sure, whatever” blow offs. I also had some spectacular failures where the things I said quickly led coworkers to get visibly angry and tell me off for my insensitivity to their situation.

Clearly, I did a lot of learning what not to do by experiencing it firsthand.

To grow as a leader, I’ve spent a lot of time exploring and trying different tools and techniques that help me deliver feedback more effectively. Following is some of what has helped me become more successful.

Start with Frameworks

There are many great resources on how to start a conversation with teams or individuals. They map out templates for a variety of situations—for example, appreciation, confrontation, delegation—and I use them to help me map out my opening statement clearly and concisely.

One of the frameworks I use often ...