Make a Criticism Sandwich or How to Give Feedback When You’d Rather Get Your Tooth Pulled

Often one of the prerequisites to formal leadership positions is having the qualifications or experience of managing a staff. However for many people, the thought of telling someone else what to do is even worse than getting their tooth pulled! I’ve heard so many folks in the nonprofit sector lament that if only they were willing to manage others, they could get promoted at their organization. And then, there are some of us that just “fall into” managing staff as our nonprofits grow. Often if you’re good at completing your own work and managing your own time well, your boss might translate that into “leadership potential”. Whatever the situation, managing others is no joke and I don’t know that it’s easy for anyone, new or experienced.

But let’s face it. Part of the difficulty in managing others is that you have to be comfortable delivering both praise and criticism. And nobody likes to give criticism as much as they hate to hear it. We’re a confrontation-averse society, and just the mention of ‘performance review’ sends chills up most employee’s spines. Why is that, when all a performance review is, essentially, is an annual meeting where someone gives and gets feedback? This year, I began directly supervising an employee for the first time, and it really freaked me out at first. I was supposed to be responsible for this person’s performance AND development?! Oh, the pressure! But. Let me tell you what’s worked for me. I made sure to give this person constant feedback, straight and simple. I like the word ‘feedback’ because it’s less intimidating than anything with the word ‘review’ or ‘appraisal’ in it. Feedback is just frequent communication that happens between a manager and her employee, allowing you to build trust and mutual consensus on how to resolve issues on a just-in-time basis. It also provides a mechanism for positive reinforcement of good performance. I delivered my first performance review for this person a few months ago, and it was music to my ears that none of what we talked about was a surprise to them. We had been having an ongoing dialogue and two-way feedback about performance, which made the review just a formality.

So, that’s the general gist of what feedback is and how it helps you manage others, but how should it literally play out in the workplace? What phrases or techniques should a nonprofit manager use to be sure feedback achieves a positive result? Enter Tim Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Workweek, who taught me how to make a ‘criticism sandwich’ in two minutes. Say what? Here’s what you do:

* Start with praise, or a positive piece of feedback about something the person has done recently
* Deliver the criticism, remembering to be very specific
* End with another positive statement to end the meeting without being awkward

Make sense? OK, how about an example. Let’s pretend we’re a fly on the wall listening to Jim, an Executive Director and Susan, his Development Director discuss an important grant proposal deadline she missed yesterday.

Jim: Hey, Susan, can we check in for a second?
Susan: Sure, Jim, what’s up?
Jim: I really appreciate all the hard work you put into the gala last week. Our donors really got a kick out of being honored at such a wonderful event.
Susan: Thanks, Jim. I’m happy it turned out the way it did.
Jim: There’s one thing I wanted to run by you, and that’s the schedule of grant proposals we set up at the beginning of the year. Each one, including the one we missed yesterday is really important in meeting our overall budget and I wondered if I could help in identifying other staff to help with the workload.
Susan: No, Jim, that’s quite alright, now that the gala is over, I’ll definitely be able to complete the rest of the proposals we have scheduled. I’m really sorry about yesterday.
Jim: I’m glad we had a chance to talk about it. By the way, nice work on your presentation to the board on Friday!
Susan: Really? I’m glad you thought so….etc. etc.

So simple, right? Chances are, Susan will now be sure to make it a top priority to meet the rest of her deadlines, helping the organization in meeting their annual budget. If you’ve never tried this feedback model, I highly encourage you to give it a spin the next time you need to talk to employees you supervise about improving their performance. It’s better than letting minor issues fester until they become big problems. And sometimes, well, getting your tooth pulled is just not an option.

Are there any other methods that others have used effectively in managing staff? What has worked for you as a manager (or as the one being managed)? Please share with readers in the comments!

Anonymous

i appreciate this entry – but i do think in the crazy multiple moments of nonprofit work — doing the “sandwich” is challenging. i do think that language is important and powerful – and that if you are providing a team member – feedback – suggestions – ideas regarding an area of development — i like those more than “criticism”. Sometimes with all the multiple things that we have to do the theory of doing the sandwich is hard to put into practice. also, in my experience as a supervisor its important to contextualize your specific role and everyones role in the team. For example, “one of my responsibilities is to ensure that we meet certain deadlines – and that includes working with you on this process. Are there ways i can support in helping the organization meet its deadlines – it seems we have missed some critical deadlines?” i am sure not an expert – but am sharing what has worked for me in my limited experience.

Thanks for brining this up – its also not a “supervisor” challenge – as team members – how do we suggestions/criticisms to our peers and/or co-workers — how sometimes become our friends in this work?
Rosetta Thurman

Thanks for sharing some more context, Anonymous. There are some different ways we can provide feedback to each other, and the piece about working with peers is really key when most of us have to operate in teams to get the work done. Me personally, I’d actually rather be criticized by my co-workers who may also be my friends. One of my best work relationships is strong b/c we can be comfortably open with each other about shortcomings and we grown b/c of it without tearing each other down. Rebecca Thorman has a great post about conflict that’s been useful to me in thinking about this as well:

http://modite.com/blog/2008/01/16/
generation-y-is-too-quiet-too-
conservative/