Real Leaders for The Real World by John McLachlan & Karen Meager

Author:John McLachlan & Karen Meager
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781909623569
Publisher: Panoma Press
Published: 2014-03-17T00:00:00+00:00

There are some people who don’t pay attention to any feedback that could suggest something might not be working or needs changing, they are not interested in problems. They think they’re just being positive, upbeat and motivational. They are actually being delusional. Here’s the newsflash: no one is perfect, it doesn’t exist.

By only sorting for evidence of what is working and putting everything (and everybody) else down as moaning or negative, you are missing the opportunity to learn from mistakes and genuinely improve. People will either think you are unrealistic and not on this planet or will keep quiet and hide things that are going wrong. Either way, you will lose credibility as a leader.

If this is you, make it your job to listen carefully to messages you may have dismissed as negative or moaning before. This is not about encouraging negative and unhelpful behaviour; if you feel there are a lot of negative people giving you feedback then probably that’s because you are not listening. Instead consider if there are any themes to this feedback which imply a general problem that needs addressing.

The balance between responding to every bump in the road and ignoring the blindingly obvious

Now that you are beginning to get a more accurate picture of what feedback you are hearing, seeing and feeling, what do you do with it? We will talk about this much more in the next chapter when we look at the trait of taking considered risks. For now, begin to think about the balance between reacting to every piece of feedback you get – we call it every bump in the road – and just carrying on regardless.

As with most things, between those two extremes there is the right way for you, and it is different for each of us. Some people will want to keep going for a long time before trying something new and some people will regularly chop and change their strategy even if it takes them away from their key strategic direction. Our question to you is: Is it working? If it is, keep doing it; if not, begin slowly and mindfully to move in the other direction.

In Conclusion

Reading this chapter you will have realised that there is a lot more to feedback than you had previously thought. You’ve learned what feedback really is and all the sources you can gather feedback from. You’ve realised that you have a pattern to how you give yourself feedback and where that helps you and where it doesn’t and you’ve also learned you have a preference for how you filter and sort feedback.

We’ve suggested ways you can begin to develop and stretch yourself using feedback and, like anything in this book, practise, get feedback, practise and develop.

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