The Happy at Work Podcast

Creating a Culture of Feedback: Margaret Cheng, Author of 'Giving Good Feedback'

• The Happy at Work Podcast • Season 6 • Episode 2

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In this episode of The Happy at Work Podcast, Laura, Michael, and Tessa speak with Margaret Cheng, author of Giving Good Feedback. 

Margaret shares her career journey from English Literature to HR and how her experiences shaped her perspective on why feedback is so essential yet challenging. She discusses how feedback culture can impact workplaces, citing examples from her career in retail, finance, and social enterprises.

Margaret offers models and techniques for structuring more effective feedback conversations, including her innovative mnemonic frameworks. She addresses challenges like implicit biases and diversity, emphasizing the need to make feedback specific, helpful, and forward-looking.

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And don't forget to check out our previous episodes for more tips and strategies to boost your workplace happiness. You can find them on your favorite podcast platform or on our website.

If you have any questions, comments, or topic suggestions for future episodes, please reach out to us. We'd love to hear from you!

Stay inspired, stay motivated, and stay happy at work!

Laura Hamill:

Welcome back for another episode of the happy at work podcast, with Laura, Tessa and Michael.

Tessa Misiaszek:

Each week, we have thoughtful conversations with leaders, founders and authors about happiness at work.

Michael McCarthy:

Tune in each Thursday for a new conversation. Enjoy the show. Welcome to the happy at work podcast. And let's welcome our guest for this session. Margaret Chang, author of giving good feedback. Margaret, welcome to the show.

margaret cheng:

Hi, thanks very much for having me.

Michael McCarthy:

Oh, we're so excited to hear about your new book. And before we get into those details, could you just walk us through? What's your career journey been? Like? How did you how did you get here,

margaret cheng:

I originally studied English Literature at university. So I was always going to write a book, I love books, I loved reading, I loved writing. And now after sort of 30 years doing HR, I finally got around to writing a book. So it's very exciting to be in this position. And I sort of fell into human resources. almost by accident, really, I was looking around for something where I could earn money. And I thought I didn't know anything about the world of business, but I knew you could earn money in the world of business. So that was where I was gonna go. And I joined a graduate training scheme at a retail organization, and sort of, they sort of sent me around different organized into different parts of their organization and got into HR from there. And since then, I've worked in retail finance, accountancy firms, social enterprises, charities, as both in HR and as a Coach and Trainer. And during that time, I've got more and more interested in what makes people happy and able to learn at work. Because a lot of the conversations that I'd have, as in my HR role will be people pitching into my office and saying, you know, I've got this issue, or I've got that issue, and trying to work out how they could do something with it. And generally, a lot of those conversations were about giving or receiving feedback. So over the over time, I've got more and more involved in training and development and learning about how we can help people learn and grow at work.

Laura Hamill:

That's, that's what I wanted to ask you. Margaret is a little bit tell us a little bit more about what you think, maybe specific experiences, or influences that have happened throughout your career that have really shaped your perspective on feedback, and, and why it's so important to having a great place to work.

margaret cheng:

I think that the most significant learning around feedback and why it's important at work came when I actually got into the workplace. And I realized that there were all sorts of ways of doing things that I just thought were the right way, because that was how I did them. And I started to get feedback about it, which wasn't the sort of feedback that I had in school, you know, where you get a report at the end of the year, and you get a, you know, one or a two or whatever. It was things about, you know, we really liked the way you do that. We're not quite sure what you did there. But that was a really helpful sort of comment, or actually, you know, what I, I will when I was working in retail, I'd get all these older ladies that would tell me, you know, yes, I will change my break and cover. flosses break, because you've asked me, but I do have to let you know that I really didn't like the way you were asked me. So I began to realize that you know, the way that we behave, the way that we talk to other people, the way we do things has an impact. And it's really helpful to know what that impact is so that you can either change it or build on it if it if it works, and grow from there.

Tessa Misiaszek:

So it's, it's pretty interesting that you you found yourself doing this work, and then you wrote a book about it. And so can you talk a little bit more about your book Summit? What is kind of its core central message as well as, you know, if you want to share a principle or two about how being able to give this effective feedback really does contribute to a better work environment. Okay.

margaret cheng:

So the book came about, really from conversations with people when I was talking, I was talking about what would be helpful in thinking about how you how you give feedback, and I got involved. I used to do a lot of training courses where I'd start off with the question, you know, when somebody says to at work, can I give you some feedback? How do you feel what's your reaction?

Tessa Misiaszek:

I feel like we should each take a moment to me to that question. Because if someone says, Can I get you some feedback up? In my mind? It goes negative right away. You know, I kind of feel like, oh, gosh, they're about to tell me something I did wrong or so for me, it's negative Michael or Laura have all for you

Michael McCarthy:

absolutely negative, I get nervous. It's like this is going to be bad. Because if it's good news, just to be like, hey, good news. Instead, we have a congress No.

Laura Hamill:

It very rarely is when somebody's gonna say something positive that they say that first. Right? It always is like, you know, like, like, clarify what's about to happen here. Right, is we're about to go into something hard. Yeah.

margaret cheng:

Yeah. So I'd got involved in all of these conversations that were exactly the same sort of response that our immediate response, when we are asked, would we like to be given some feedback as a stress response, it's like, it's going to be negative, there's going to be something wrong with it. So the book was designed really to deal with some of those issues. And it answers essentially, three questions. The first one is what is feedback? And why is it important? The second one is Why is it so hard? And the third one is how can we make it easier. And I guess, a lot of the issues me around what makes feedback hard and what why we find it difficult are really around lots of things, I suppose but the way we have made it complicated at work, the way we have set up feedback at work, often down to people like me, in HR, who have put in place processes and procedures and ways of giving feedback that do involve people, you know, saying I'm, I'm a sit this person down and give them feedback at work. But don't really involve a relationship where you have a bit of a back and forth on what works, what doesn't work, you know, in the way that you would with your partner at home. Because feedback, if we start off by thinking what feedback actually is, is actually quite unnatural human activity, you know, involves communication, it's basically about communication. And we communicate all the time, whether we know we're communicating or not. So on that basis, we're giving feedback all the time, whether we know we're doing it or not. And because we've made it complicated, but with systems and processes and procedures at work, we've forgotten that actually all feedback is, is really communicating information, or opinion, or reactions to something somebody's done, or said, or some work, and the impact of those things. And we need to have all of those information and reaction and opinions, because that's the only way that we get a sense of the impacts of the things that we say or do. So that we can learn. Most of us like to learn and grow, you know, it's it makes life interesting, you know, gives you skills. But feedback won't help us do that. Unless it's given in the spirit of being helpful and supportive, and helping us move, you know, round, something like David copes learning circle, where you have an experience, you get a bit of feedback on it, which helps you think about it, you try it again, differently next time than you do it again. And we go through that cycle again, and again and again, in our lives. And at work, we need to be able to provide an environment where people can go round that learning circle in a way that is helpful and supportive.

Michael McCarthy:

Beautiful. And Margaret, it you've had a lot of experience in in the feedback arena, how have you seen the practice of giving and receiving feedback impacts the overall dynamics of a workplace?

margaret cheng:

Feedback, I guess, because it's linked so closely to communication, and the way that we communicate how well it works in an organization. And the impact that it has on an organization depends a lot on the sort of communication norms in that organization. So for example, quite early on in my career, I had an experience working in the financial services company, where the environment was a very critical one, a very competitive one, you know, they really prided themselves on being very direct about their feedback and making sure that people always knew where they stood. But what it actually meant in practice, was that people just spent a lot of time criticizing everybody but not actually to their faces to other people. So there will be lots of rating meetings and appraisal meetings where they were talking about, oh, Tessa is not really a team player issue, or Michael is not really getting on with things this year. It is a bit slow, you know, sort of all sorts of comments that have not been discussed with the individuals necessary but were then included somehow in the stories that were created about these individuals in the company. So it creates an environment where people didn't really feel very safe didn't feel and that they had relationship build relationships with, with people terribly well. And although they had all sorts of very complicated and expensive training programs, and Sid would say that they put a lot of emphasis on development and growth, because there was no sort of very helpful feedback. It sort of didn't, didn't really work or progress. So people didn't really feel safe to learn to do new things, what they felt comfortable doing was apportioning blame, and making sure that it was clear if anything ever went wrong, whose fault it was, but not really thinking about how they could do things differently or do better next time. So in terms of that organization's growth and ability to thrive, it didn't last very long in the end. And it collapsed in the wake of a high profile, an actual scandal. Whereas another organization, I worked at a retail company where they were very practical, they didn't have a lot of money to spend on training, because all the margins were quite tight. So they would encourage people to essentially learn on the job. So they recruit people in New from college, put them in management positions, and then help them learn how to be managers simply by helping them to get feedback from the people they work directly with, who were often very experienced people who, you know, knew everything there was to know about the things that they were selling. And got a lot of experience of life and dealing with customers and the environment. And that because the culture of that organization was about respectful communication, where you would really spend time talking to people and talking to them about what works, what hadn't worked, what was going to happen that day, how they would organize the day, people built quite close relationships. And that meant that it was possible for the more experienced people who were also the more junior people to share their experience and their feelings about how management communicated with them, for example, much more clearly. Which meant that people could learn and grow in a much more helpful than supportive sort of way.

Laura Hamill:

So really sounds like there's such a tight connection with culture, right, is what I hear you saying is to accompany examples, for sure. Yeah, thanks for pointing, pointing that out. I'm curious about maybe at an individual level, if you have any stories of kind of individual people or individual managers with teams of positive examples where they were able to, you know, really change how they approached feedback. And it had a greatly great outcome maybe on how the team worked, or the collaboration or some some of those kinds of outcomes?

margaret cheng:

Yeah, I mean, I think one of the best examples I'd heard about feedback and how it can really work if you put just put a bit of time and effort into building the relationships first was, I'd worked with an organization where there had been two groups coming together from two different organizations that they were merging two small companies, one from with a, particularly with a moral sort of aggressive, go ahead, American sort of culture, one with a very terribly sort of British old fashioned This is how we do things here sort of culture, and they had to work together. And there were all sorts of initially there was all sorts of grumbling in the office about between the two groups, you know, doesn't James understand how to talk to people he's just walking around with his head and the shouting people just do it. That wasn't a request, Clive, get on with it. You know, and doesn't Clive understand that, actually, you know, you're supposed to get on and do stuff at work and not, you know, rush off at six o'clock to get off to your choir or whatever it is you doing in the evening. And what we found was helpful was just to have some groups where they would essentially just swap conversations and have conversations about what was going on over a sort of social discussion at lunchtime. But we set it up with a sort of way of getting people to talk. So each person would have to say something about what had been going on in their day, and what were the challenges and how are things going and people weren't allowed to react other than just listen. And actually, because of that, they learned a lot about each other. And they learned to actually some people thought it was important to leave work on time to go and carry out social activities. Other people didn't think that was as important because they were very focused on their career and they wanted to move forward. But it meant that they could then tailor their communication accordingly, so that any feedback that they were giving could be helpful and could be supportive around that person, and the way it needed to be communicated to them.

Tessa Misiaszek:

So Margaret, I think what's so interesting about what you're saying is that there that we all have these filters that we kind of see the world, and what might be important to one person around having work life balance, and leaving at six o'clock and doing, you know, being with my social activities or my family, to someone else, it may, it may not hold the same way. And as a result, we're kind of all looking at each other through these filters and these lenses. So it makes I would imagine, that's what's that's why it's such an important skilling that has to really happen, not just for the person who's giving the feedback, but also the person who's receiving feedback. So, you know, in kind of, to play off of Laura's question around creating that feedback culture, or a culture of feedback, you know, especially when people are hesitant to give feedback or people don't seem to be able to really embrace constructive feedback very well, what are, you know, anything else you would you could suggest for organizations to think about, not just providing the skilling for this is how you deliver feedback, but also how can you receive feedback without becoming defensive? Or, you know, without judgment? What are your thoughts on that?

margaret cheng:

So I think with feedback, the the key thing is always that it is helpful, and that it is clear. So there's a, it's helpful to have as an organization of sort of shared vocabulary around feedback that you can all come back to, and questions. So if if you're giving feedback to somebody, you need to it's helpful to follow through a sort of structure that helps you break down what it is that you're saying, so that you can really check yourself about why you're saying it. So going back to your point about and all the filters that we have a really important question to ask yourself, before you give any feedback is, Am I really giving feedback? Or am I just saying Why aren't you more like me? And what has gone into that idea that you're giving this person some feedback? At this point? Is it going to be helpful for them? Is it going to help them round Kolb's Learning circle? Or is it going to be helpful for you, because it makes you feel a bit better to get it off your chest and tell them that they're useless because they didn't arrive on time for the meeting or whatever the feedback is. In the same way, if you're receiving feedback, that is not helpful for you, for whatever reason, so say, somebody makes some sort of comment that is not very clear in the sense that it doesn't comment on a behavior. So for me, if you're giving helpful feedback, you're always commenting on somebody's behavior and the impact of that behavior on on you or on the person or on the work that you're trying to produce together. If it's commenting instead on your personality, in a sort of generalized way or offering some sort of judgments. So you know, sort of saying you're, you're not a team player, or you're you're just a bit slow, or you're just not very good at that that's not particularly helpful. Feedback is helpful when it's clear and when it's focused on a very specific example. So in the book, I've got one, pneumonic, which is helpful for people to work through when they're giving people feedback, or questioning feedback, you can use it in both directions. And that's called paces. And it looks at people's what you're giving feedback on in a quite a structured sort of way. So first of all, you the P stands for perception. So what is it that you're actually seeing the person doing? And what are they actually doing? And you sort of work through from there to essentially, you're essentially sort of filming what it is that they're doing, or getting the nearest thing to a film of what they're doing, so that you can do the nearest thing to following them around with a video camera and see what the behavior is that you're seeing. And challenge your perception of that. So you've got an idea that Clive isn't a team player, what are you seeing on your film that makes you think that he's not a team player? And what is he actually supposed to be doing at that point, anyway, to challenge your perception, and what are the consequences of what it is that he's doing or not doing? And then the important parts after you've done that little bit of exploration is explaining and exploring with them, what it is that you think you've seen, and what their comments are about that. And then sharing for success in the future. So having ideas for both of you as to what's worked or or hasn't worked there. And that's, you can use that if you get a piece of feedback that isn't helpful. You can say, well, what is it specifically that you saw me do or not do that's leading you to say that That's about me. And can we talk about how to how to do it differently in the future. So all that feedback, then is very clear, very focused on a specific example. And not judging. It's simply saying, you know, what I've noticed is this. And this is what I think we can talk about for the future.

Michael McCarthy:

I love that. Thank you, Margaret. And now I'm going to twist a little bit, and I'm going to, I'm going to ask you for advice on how to give my boss feedback about the way he gives me feedback. So a little background is, when I, when I get called in, it's always it's always an email around 5pm At night, saying, Please, let's have a meeting at your earliest convenience. Tomorrow is good for me. So I get to be nervous about that all day. And then I walk in, and I get what we call the sandwich. And so he starts out with this, Oh, you're such a wonderful person and love you in the organization. And I don't listen to any of that, because I know what's in the middle of the sandwich. And then I get the boom. And it's easy. It's, it's, it's not nasty. It's not nice. It's just it is what it is. And then it ends with this, you know, nice thing, and I don't I don't like it, because it's it's anxious, you know, for 24 hours before I actually had the meeting. I also don't feel like there's a lot of trust in there, because there isn't the sincerity with the sandwich thing. So how do you suggest leaders navigate these challenges? Because I know my boss wants to use the feedback as a tool for growth, I get that he's a nice guy, he means well, but it's making me like really nervous. And I I am not psychologically safe. So how can I give him feedback on how to be different? I can handle that I did something wrong, I can handle that. It's it's the way he's doing it. How would you how could he do that better?

margaret cheng:

Well, I mean, it's a good starting point, Michael, you could buy him a copy of my book, as, for example, Christmas, if there's a Secret Santa thing you could buy as a sort of slightly passive aggressive on feedback, and then you could sort of say this, you know, this is something I've been reading this, it's helpful, perhaps we could use this as a way of giving feedback together. Because I think often with feedback, it's, it's quite difficult to say to somebody, I don't like the way you give me feedback, isn't it and but that sandwich thing is the worst thing ever, isn't it because at some stage, there was a whole set of training programs where people were told this is the way to give feedback. And it does mean that there's a whole generation of people who are just waiting for the negative, as they have the bits of positive, rather than a setup where you give people feedback all the time you get used to it. So you have feedback, you know, as you go along. Rather than as a sort of a separate thing, or it's difficult. So I would have some sort of conversation that will be around. I would like to talk about how I can learn and grow and how you can help me do that. And I know that you want to do me to help me do that. Because you know, I know you're a nice guy, and you're committed to giving feedback and being helpful to me in my career. These are a couple of the models that I would like to use. Can we talk those through and maybe have a meeting, initially once a week or twice a month? So you know, whatever interval feels comfortable for you, where essentially you just run through what's been going on that week? What feedback have we got, perhaps for each other? On that meeting with that client, what went well, what was I happy with? What would I like feedback on what did you feel went well? And what would you like feedback on so you just get into the habit of chewing and froing on it, if that would be helpful, and use a structure to go through it so that you take the emotion out of it. Really, those compensations are often difficult because of the emotions that are involved. And if you can focus it very much on specific examples, the behaviors in a specific example, and work through a process with it. It's a lot easier then to have those conversations without worrying about negative stuff coming forward.

Laura Hamill:

Nice. So I wanted to follow up on something you said earlier that just jumped out at me. The Why aren't you more like me feedback. I just thought that really like made me think really hard because I feel like a lot of times the harder feedback sessions I've had are about that. And so I'm really curious around how you think about your techniques and approaches around feedback. When we think about diverse population ends are populations that maybe aren't the same as the person who's in the position of power, maybe giving that feedback. So what are your thoughts around that?

margaret cheng:

So the starting point, always with feedback, particularly, if you're dealing with a diverse work force, dealing with people from sort of all sorts of different backgrounds, you know, often people are giving feedback now, you know, to multiple people in multiple countries on Zoom sometimes, which is not the most helpful for him to be getting feedback on anyway. But to somebody from a completely different culture, or who you don't know very well, it's, that can all be quite difficult. So I guess go back to what the definition of feedback would be, which is that it's information opinion, on and reactions to something that somebody has done that is related to the work that you're trying to do together, or has an impact on you and your relationship together. And it's about communication. So it's a communication process that is intended to be helpful, and is intended to guide that person around the learning circle, so that they can grow and develop in their role and in the way that they do their work. So if you keep bringing back whatever feedback you want to give to that idea. And then as you're preparing for the feedback session, you're thinking very carefully about what would be helpful for this person, what would help them around the learning circle? How do they need me to communicate with them, so that they can understand that and depending on where that person comes from, if there's some neurodiverse issues there, if they just come from a very different background to you, that's something that you need to build and work, work through, before you can really give them any helpful feedback. So giving somebody feedback, for example, about if I keep coming back to this idea of team player, but that's, you know, in big corporate, sometimes that can be something people can say, you know, you just need to be a bit, join the team, join in with the team a bit more, be a bit more of a team player. And it's like, well, what does that mean? Actually, that means? Can you come for drinks on a Friday night? Well, actually, no, I can't because I have responsibilities at home, or I don't drink. You know, I feel very uncomfortable around alcohol, you know, it could be a whole range of different things. What is it about that drinking or being there on a Friday night? That is important to the work? Is it about building the team? In which case perhaps is another way that we can build some team spirit? Or is it about our relationship and having some time just to talk? Or is it actually just about you, because you'd like to get a drink on Friday night, you know, that's the sort of the, I guess, the way to work through it. So in the book was a couple of other models that are helpful to think about around that sort of process, there's another one called forces. So with the idea that feedback should always be forward looking. Owned. Regular, clear, enabling and specific. And when it's owned, it's essentially saying, I have noticed this, and the impact of it is this, let's think for what not not apportion blame and criticize and say that's wrong. But let's think about what we can do about that in the future to mean that the work and the the team and everything else is progressing and moving forward, and you're learning new skills and doing new things. Margaret,

Unknown:

I could continue this conversation for hours, because there's so much you just said in that last 30 seconds that even Michael, you know, kind of knowing both Michael and I have worked at a university setting and you know, oftentimes the way we hear feedback is well, the students are saying this or the students are saying that and and sometimes your direct manager Dean won't done the investigation to see is that really happening or the students offer? You know, I think it but I think a lot of people rely on Oh, well I heard this so let's address it without really being owned by the person giving the feedback so that among so many other nuggets of gold, I feel like are in your book, I have ordered it and it's really fascinating because actually, the people managers on in our organization are actually next month having a our people managers meeting around giving feedback, and I'm going to recommend that they buy your book.

Tessa Misiaszek:

So, thank you so much for being here. It was just a wonderful discussion. Again, I think the models you provide sound like they they just will provide the level of structure that's required. really takes a lot of the guesswork out and the emotion out and allows people to and again, like you said, if you introduce these structures as a shared language within the organization, then people know what to expect when they're when they're getting feedback as well. And it probably removes a lot of anxiety. So, thank you so much. Good luck with your book, and I hope that we can have you back on the podcast in the future. To talk more about these topics. It was really wonderful.

Michael McCarthy:

We hope you've enjoyed this episode. If you'd like to hear future episodes, be sure to subscribe to the happy at work podcast, and leave us a review with your thoughts.

Tessa Misiaszek:

Are you interested in speaking on a future episode or want to collaborate with us? Let us know. You can send us an email at admin at happy at work podcast.com

Laura Hamill:

And lastly, follow us on LinkedIn or Twitter for even more happiness. See you soon

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Laura Hamill, PhD

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Michael McCarthy

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Tessa Misiaszek, PhD

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Ariel Folkerts

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