How effective can a group personnel review be when the reviewers (managers) each are reluctant to say anything that would make them seem as not a team player? Is there ever a time when an employee canbe effectively and efficiently reviewed by a team of people? I am speaking of a small non-profit which hired an executive director and who gets perfomance reviews from 3 directors, whom the executive director has had a hand in naming. Seems to me that this person would never get a bad review.

The Team Doc Says…

In two words — not very. Team reviews are only effective if there is a strong foundation of trust for every member of the team. If that doesn’t exist, I would avoid team reviews like the plague. It would be a total waste of time and effort, plus it would add no value to the employee or company whatsoever.

Sometimes it might seem like everyone around your workplace expects you to act like a coach by making sure you practice good team leader behaviors, but when it comes to them it’s a different story. This could be an issue for you if it’s your boss. She might talk a good game about working as a team, and then her actions are exactly the opposite. Since this is your supervisor, you may be hesitant to bring up the topic of making sure his actions match his words. Here are three potential ways you might deal with this.

1. You can find another boss.
2. You can live with the situation as it is.
3. You can “coach up” by providing him feedback when you have good opportunities to do so. You would want to prep for this by jotting down situations that demonstrate he is not a team player. You’ll also want to crystallize your thoughts on what feedback you might provide so your feedback is helpful and has the potential to change behavior.

If you selected #3, you win the prize for bravery in a team leadership role. Give yourself a hearty pat on the back. 

You’ve bumped into the hardest part about working in a team-based environment — doing what you say. And remember, people will believe what you do more than what you say. If the words don’t match the action, the action always wins hands down.

You can be sure your team is paying attention. You most certainly cannot control the behaviors of your supervisor. But you can be the leader you would like to see in others . Too many times we wait for someone else to start when we can be a catalyst ourselves. And, often when others see what’s working for us, they follow suit. Take the lead and others will follow.

What do you think? Is this really possible or just a theory? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Feedback is a really important part of professional development. Sharing feedback with your team, having them give each other feedback, or getting feedback from the team are all good opportunities for team members to continuously improve and for you to grow in your team leader role.

You will have to set the example for the team and create an environment of trust that makes it okay to share feedback. You should provide your team with a balance of positive feedback and feedback for improvement — some people call this “negative” feedback, but I’m not wild about that term. Ensure you create an environment where feedback is viewed as an opportunity for growth, not just an opportunity to point out where someone has done something wrong.

To help your team integrate feedback into their day-to-day activities, you will have to create some structure around the process first. One way to start would be to have a quick morning meeting every day or at least a couple times a week just to share feedback.

In these sessions, each person should provide feedback to team members using the feedback model. The format for positive feedback should be ‘what and why’ for what someone did well and why the person providing the feedback thought it went well. To provide feedback for improvement, the ‘what, what and why’ model should be used. During this type of feedback, you will offer what someone did, what they could have done better and why.

Having an open culture of multi-way feedback on your team gives everyone a chance to grow. Plus it opens up communication channels and keeps everyone on the same page.

Do you share regular feedback on your team? Let’s talk about it.

This topic was originally featured in my weekly Team Building Tips newsletter. Are you a subscriber? Get timely team building tips and tools straight to your email box by signing up here.

Picture this. You’ve been humming along doing your job and helping your team achieve its goals when you get a call about a meeting to discuss an issue that’s come up. Unable to find out the details about what’s going on, you’re totally in the dark.

So you show up at the meeting and find out that you’re the problem. And you never knew it. Sadly, this is what happens in way too many organizations.

Rather then dealing with issues as they arise through discussion and feedback, the manager you report to “saves it up” and unloads when he can’t take it anymore.

How unfair is that?

This manager is doing you and the organization you work for a complete disservice. Here’s why:

• You can’t change what you don’t know. If no one tells you what you need to correct, you can’t be expected to do things differently. I have yet to meet anyone who is a mind reader. People need to be told when different action should be taken.
• Someone else may be picking up the slack. If you’re doing it wrong, someone else has to fix it. That means they are being taken away from what they should be doing. What a waste of time and money.
• The information may be incorrect. Do you remember the old telephone game? Information rarely gets passed from one person to another exactly the way it happened. Everyone listens through their own filters and if you weren’t part of the discussion, an opportunity to clarify what happened has been lost.

So here’s what you need to do.

Ask your manager (and whoever brought the issue to his attention) to involve you in the discussion when it happens. That way you’ll have an opportunity to clarify the issue and correct it if needed.

And make sure you are walking this talk too. Check your behaviors to ensure you aren’t making assumptions and holding on to feedback with your team.

This topic was originally featured in my weekly Team Building Tips newsletter. Are you a subscriber? Get timely team building tips and tools straight to your email box by signing up here.