What Is Your Team Afraid to Tell You? | A Bit of Optimism: Feelings at Work | PART 3

1. 0:00 – 2:33

   The Spinach in Your Teeth Problem: Why We Avoid Giving Feedback

   1. ASAlex Simon0:00

      There are really small changes that people can make, leaders and also just everyone on teams can make, that will make everyone else's lives feel better.

   2. SSSimon Sinek0:09

      Yeah.

   3. ASAlex Simon0:09

      It's like the thing that people are sidebarring, texting me like, "Oh my God, can you believe that he just did this and that?" It's like, well, no one's telling him.

   4. SSSimon Sinek0:15

      Yeah.

   5. ASAlex Simon0:15

      So how is he supposed to fix it?

   6. SSSimon Sinek0:16

      Yeah.

   7. ASAlex Simon0:16

      I'm obsessed with the fact that all of the information about how I can grow and improve is oft-

   8. SSSimon Sinek0:20

      In the room

   9. ASAlex Simon0:21

      ... is in the room and in my blind spot.

   10. SSSimon Sinek0:23

       Yeah.

   11. ASAlex Simon0:23

       And the only way that I can figure it out is by asking for it, and by receiving it well.

   12. SSSimon Sinek0:27

       If you have spinach in your teeth, you'd want someone to tell you, right? Sure, it's an awkward three seconds, but helpful for the rest of the day. So why is it that when someone on our team is missing deadlines or dominating meetings or doing that one thing that drives everyone crazy, nobody says anything to them? Instead, we side text our colleagues, we vent to our friends, or we carry a quiet resentment for months. But do we say anything to the person to try and fix the issue? No, because that would be too uncomfortable. Giving someone feedback is one of, if not the hardest things to do. We don't want to upset people, we don't want to start a fight, and even if we do give the feedback, we can't even be sure that it was properly received. Here's the good news. There are simple techniques we can learn to give us more confidence to have those uncomfortable conversations, and when we do, for them to go well. Instead of taking a summer hiatus, we're presenting a special five-episode series of A Bit of Optimism to go deep on human skills, the things that help us connect, collaborate, and succeed in any human relationship. That's why I invited Alex Simon to join me. She's the founder of LifeShop, where she teaches emotional intelligence. And over these five episodes, we will tackle some of the messier interactions, like having hard conversations, people pleasing, listening, and taking accountability. And of course, this one, giving feedback. Because in this age of AI, sure, the AI can write your performance review, it can draft the talking points, but feedback only works when a human being looks another human being in the eye and says, "I care about you enough to tell you this." That part is still very human. So here's what you can expect from this episode. First, I'll share a simple technique that I learned from the US Air Force that has completely changed the culture at our office in how we give and receive feedback. It turns criticism from something people are uncomfortable with into something they more than tolerate, they actually want it.

2. 2:33 – 3:26

   The Feedback Technique That Changed Everything

   1. SSSimon Sinek2:33

      Once you hear this technique, you'll become obsessed with it, just like I have. Next, we explore a deceptively simple way to say a hard thing without blowing up a relationship. And finally, I'll share an amazing story of a leader who I admire who learned the hard way how feedback works, when it's appropriate to give it, and how to give it in a way that people can actually hear it. She thought her feedback would help people improve their performance. It turns out there's much more to understand about human dynamics than that. So let me start with my first bit of feedback for you. I care about you and I want you to be the best feedback giver and receiver you can be. And if you enjoy this episode, please remember to subscribe. This is A Bit of Optimism.

3. 3:26 – 6:08

   What to Do When Feedback Goes Wrong

   1. SSSimon Sinek3:26

      Let's talk about feedback. Feedback is one of those underappreciated things in a company. Everybody knows that you have to give it. Everybody knows at some point you have to receive it. People like getting good feedback. A lot of people don't like getting bad feedback. And a lot of people don't know how to give it, and a lot of people don't know how to receive it.

   2. ASAlex Simon3:45

      Mm-hmm.

   3. SSSimon Sinek3:45

      And both are teachable. I had a colleague who I needed to give feedback to. And like most people, I tend to give feedback the way I like to receive feedback. I like it plain and simple, just tell me what you need to tell me. I despise feedback sandwiches. You know, something generic and positive, something really specific and negative, and something generic and positive. That's supposed to make somebody feel good. Just tell me what you need to tell me and let's just be done with it, right? And so that's how I give feedback. Turns out, not everybody likes to [laughs] receive feedback that way.

   4. ASAlex Simon4:16

      Who knew? [laughs]

   5. SSSimon Sinek4:17

      Who knew? So I worked with somebody and I needed to give her some feedback, and I gave it to her. It did not go well. In fact, it became a fight.

   6. ASAlex Simon4:26

      Wow.

   7. SSSimon Sinek4:26

      Yeah. And what I was hoping was a relatively quick and easy feedback session ended up being an hour of de-escalation. It was rough. And then it happened again. You know, months later, I gave some feedback. Did not go well. It became a fight and an hour of de-escalation. And I said to her, "We have to figure this out, because I have to give you feedback, and I can't go through this every time, and I know you don't wanna go through this every time. This is awful." And she said, "Feedback's fine, but I don't like the way you give it to me." And I was like, "Well then, how do you want me to give it to you?" And she said, "I just need to be prepared. Just say, 'Can I give you some feedback?'"

   8. ASAlex Simon5:08

      Right.

   9. SSSimon Sinek5:08

      "It's, it's gonna be really hard to give you.' I need to be mentally prepared so I can take a deep breath if s-

   10. ASAlex Simon5:12

       Yeah

   11. SSSimon Sinek5:12

       ... if it's gonna be hard." I went, "Okay." She goes, "And sometimes I wanna schedule it." I'm like, "And that's it?" She's like, "Yeah, that's it." I'm like, "Fine." So in the future, I was like, "Hey, I need to give you some feedback. It's gonna be uncomfortable. Can we do it now?" And she'd be like, " [breathes] Yeah." Or she'd be like, "Can we do it on Thursday at 3:00?" I'd be like, "Yeah, I can do Thursday at 3:00." You know?

   12. ASAlex Simon5:32

       Yeah.

   13. SSSimon Sinek5:32

       And me simply adjusting to how she wanted the feedback, she could actually take more intense feedback than almost anybody on the team, so long as she was prepared for it. And that's when I realized, that's when I learned, that we have to teach people how to give it, and we have to allow people to ask for it the way they want it. And if we get it right, I mean, it, it helps everybody. And when we get it wrong, it, it literally could- completely undermine, uh, any kind of relationships or productivity or joy somebody

4. 6:08 – 8:05

   What a Strong Feedback Culture Looks Like

   1. SSSimon Sinek6:08

      has at work. What have you learned about what feedback is, how it works, how it's received, how it's given?

   2. ASAlex Simon6:13

      Well, maybe I can start by saying how completely feedback obsessed I am. So my first job out of college, I was a management consultant, and the firm that I worked at was obsessed with feedback. You had feedback with your supervisor, your direct supervisor every week. You had feedback with everyone else on your team every other week. You had feedback with the partner on your case once a month, like a direct time. And it wasn't called feedback, it was called PD, professional development. And it was a huge part of the culture. And for me, it was normal 'cause it was my first job out of college. I thought every job had that. And I was talking, uh, to one of my best friends from college, like we had a year or two into being like working in our 20s and she was describing some horrible situation she was having at work. I said, "Well, why don't you bring it up in, in your feedback session?" She was like, "What are you talking about?" [laughs] And I said, "The next time you have feedback with your manager, like next week, why don't you bring it up?" She said, "I have feedback with my manager once a year for my performance review." And I said, "That's bananas. When are you supposed to bring things up? Like, how are you, how are you supposed to fix things?" And she said, "We don't." It broke my brain, like because it had been such an integral part of the culture and it worked so well. I was, I just found it inconceivable that not everyone could have access to that all the time. And then I quickly learned, of course, that like most companies don't have strong feedback cultures, and there's so much feedback avoidance and it, then you're missing the goldmine of information that is like what's working well for you, what's not working well for you, and then you're kind of repeating the same mistakes over and over again. It broke my brain then, it breaks my brain today. To me, it's like the simplest and most powerful intervention that any company or person can do.

   3. SSSimon Sinek7:45

      One of the worst examples I ever saw of it, um, which is the avoidant part, there's this company, very large company, 100,000 employees, right? It's a company that you've heard of. And they were so obsessed with having a nice culture, and everyone was nice to each other, and everybody was so nice. The way they interpreted nice was they never gave anybody feedback,

5. 8:05 – 10:35

   The "Nice" Company That Was Actually Cruel: Feedback Avoidance

   1. SSSimon Sinek8:05

      and any feedback they gave was pablum, you know? And so if somebody was underperforming, instead of sitting down and having the hard conversation with them and trying to like help them out, they would just move them from team to team.

   2. ASAlex Simon8:16

      Oh my gosh.

   3. SSSimon Sinek8:16

      They would just get bumped, and then they would be underperforming, and they would get bumped to another team. And people had entire careers, like they were there for years just going from team to team to team. And if you're the underperformer, first of all, you're not an idiot. You, you can see that you keep getting moved, so you're like, "Clearly my career is going nowhere," and you're not getting the feedback, which means you continue to be an underperformer so that it ends up destroying people's self-confidence. So then they don't have the self-confidence to leave and find another job. They don't have the self-confidence to raise their hand and be like, "Can somebody please tell me what's going on here?"

   4. ASAlex Simon8:45

      Mm-hmm.

   5. SSSimon Sinek8:45

      And it's just the whole thing ends up being this huge passive-aggressive culture. Everybody's nice, and nobody tells you anything. They gave plenty of good feedback, but they weren't willing to give difficult feedback or uncomfortable feedback.

   6. ASAlex Simon8:58

      To me, it's like food in your teeth. I am always-- I pride myself on being the first person to tell someone when they have food in their teeth. You have food in your [laughs] teeth. You don't have anything. I would've told you.

   7. SSSimon Sinek9:08

      Yeah. Thank you. Yeah.

   8. ASAlex Simon9:08

      Yeah, and you know I would have.

   9. SSSimon Sinek9:09

      I, I, I do.

   10. ASAlex Simon9:10

       To me, feedback is like the higher stakes version of that. If I had chocolate all over my teeth and I was walking to, like a client meeting, I would expect my team to say, "Alex, you have a ton of chocolate in your teeth." [laughs] And so why would I not expect them to tell me like, "Oh, by the way, the way that you ask questions makes people feel like this."

   11. SSSimon Sinek9:27

       And I know the answer. 'Cause people don't know how.

   12. ASAlex Simon9:29

       Yeah.

   13. SSSimon Sinek9:29

       And when you don't have the skill, then you just don't do it or you do it badly.

   14. ASAlex Simon9:35

       Yeah.

   15. SSSimon Sinek9:35

       And people, once they reach a management position, you know, congratulations, you're now, you know, in a management position. What training will I get in my middle management? Oh, we'll give you new business cards. Oh, no, no, no, there's no training, but now you have to have at least annual feedback sessions. Oh, and you're gonna do 360s, and you're gonna do monthly meetings. And even if you're like a really well-intentioned young leader and be like, "You know what? I'm gonna do PD. I'm gonna do personal development every week with my team." But nobody tells you how to do it.

   16. ASAlex Simon10:01

       Okay, so that's one reason is that we don't know how. What do you-

   17. SSSimon Sinek10:02

       We don't know how.

   18. ASAlex Simon10:03

       What do you think are the other things that stop us from being-

   19. SSSimon Sinek10:05

       We don't wanna hurt somebody's feelings.

   20. ASAlex Simon10:06

       Yeah. We would rather kind of hurt their feelings in a subtle way where they're being confused all the time in the long-term manner.

   21. SSSimon Sinek10:13

       Well, it's like that, that's passive aggression, right?

   22. ASAlex Simon10:15

       Yeah.

   23. SSSimon Sinek10:15

       And I think there's also power dynamics, which is, you know, we view feedback as something that is given down the chain of command, but rarely up. And, you know, I appreciate companies that do 360s when they're done properly, when they're done well, because everybody has to know. One of the best feedback loops I learned about, um, is actually done by the Army Rangers.

6. 10:35 – 14:24

   The Army Rangers' Three-Level Evaluation System

   1. SSSimon Sinek10:35

      There's three levels to Army Ranger School. At the end of each one, there's an evaluation before you can make it to the second one, and then be- then an evaluation before you make it to the third one, then third one, and then you can graduate. At the end of each track, they have three evaluations. One is very, um, empirical. Did you perform the tasks within the timeframe required? Right? It's data. Yes, no, you did it in this time, you failed, you passed. Right? Very, very simple. The second one is your teacher, the, the, the instructor. Does the instructor think you're good and ready to go to the next level?

   2. ASAlex Simon11:10

      Mm-hmm.

   3. SSSimon Sinek11:10

      And that used to be it, and they discovered that they had this thing called Spotlight Rangers, which people who were like, they were fricking machines out in the field. They did everything. They were the fastest. They were the best. They were incredible. The instructors love them. They're like, "This kid's gonna be a great Ranger one day. I love this kid." But then when the spotlight was turned off, that person was an asshole, but nobody knew-

   4. ASAlex Simon11:31

      Yeah

   5. SSSimon Sinek11:31

      ... because there was no mechanism.

   6. ASAlex Simon11:32

      Yeah.

   7. SSSimon Sinek11:33

      And so they implemented the third thing, which was peer, peer review. So now you need to pass all three. You need to empirically be good at your job, the instructor s- needs to think you're good, and the other Ranger candidates evaluate you. And the way they did the evaluation was absolutely incredible.

   8. ASAlex Simon11:51

      How'd they do it?

   9. SSSimon Sinek11:52

      I will tell you [laughs] 'cause it's absolutely incredible.

   10. ASAlex Simon11:54

       [laughs] I love seeing you so lit up.

   11. SSSimon Sinek11:55

       It's one page, so you have to fill out this form multiple times, depending if there's 12 people in the class, you fill it out 11 times, right? And the first thing you do is they have the values of the organization written down, and you have to evaluate each Ranger candidate if they're upholding the values based on your assessment. Then you have to rank all the Rangers in terms of Best to worst. I'm not sure I like that part of it, but I get it. But then there's my favorite, favorite, favorite question that they ask on every evaluation: Would you go to war with this Ranger?

   12. ASAlex Simon12:23

       Mm.

   13. SSSimon Sinek12:23

       Would you share a foxhole with this Ranger?

   14. ASAlex Simon12:25

       What's a foxhole? [laughs]

   15. SSSimon Sinek12:26

       It's a hole in the ground-

   16. ASAlex Simon12:28

       Mm

   17. SSSimon Sinek12:28

       ... that you just sit and wait all day. Sharing a foxhole with somebody, the, the business equivalent would be like, would you pitch a new piece of business-

   18. ASAlex Simon12:35

       Mm

   19. SSSimon Sinek12:35

       ... with this colleague? Would you get stuck at an airport for six hours with this colleague?

   20. ASAlex Simon12:39

       Yeah.

   21. SSSimon Sinek12:39

       Right? It's the, it's that equivalent. And what I love about that is, oh, my God, yes, I'd go to war with this person because they're a machine, they're brilliant. Look at their skills, incredible. Would I share a foxhole? Heck, no. And it was revealing of character.

   22. ASAlex Simon12:49

       Yeah.

   23. SSSimon Sinek12:49

       And it was just one page, and they gave it to them when they retired because they found out that when they retired, they were more honest.

   24. ASAlex Simon12:54

       Wow.

   25. SSSimon Sinek12:55

       Yeah. And you had to be a good person as well as being good at your job, as well as being good at managing up, in order to make it to the next level.

   26. ASAlex Simon13:05

       Mm-hmm.

   27. SSSimon Sinek13:06

       And one of the things they told me was they also evaluate how somebody receives feedback. That actually goes into the evaluation. So they sit down with each Ranger and be like, "So we've got your evals here, um, and your colleagues think you're an asshole." And if the Ranger goes, "Huh, well, that's not good. All right. Okay, I'm gonna work on that. Thank you for that," versus, "I know what happened. There was this one-"

   28. ASAlex Simon13:33

       Yeah

   29. SSSimon Sinek13:33

       ... "incident on Th- I know why they said that."

   30. ASAlex Simon13:35

       Who wrote that?
7. 14:24 – 16:46

   Why Giving Feedback Feels So Hard

   1. ASAlex Simon14:24

      think it's so difficult?

   2. SSSimon Sinek14:24

      It's hard to give. It's hard to hear.

   3. ASAlex Simon14:26

      Mm.

   4. SSSimon Sinek14:26

      Um, especially if you care about your work, it's never good to hear that you didn't do something well.

   5. ASAlex Simon14:32

      Yeah.

   6. SSSimon Sinek14:32

      Or it's h- very hard to tell somebody that there's a behavioral issue.

   7. ASAlex Simon14:38

      It's hard when it feels so personal.

   8. SSSimon Sinek14:40

      Uh, it's hard, and I think it's hard when it feels personal. A lot of feedback is personal.

   9. ASAlex Simon14:44

      Yeah. And I think to your point, you've, you've brought up a couple times a beautiful distinction between taking, uh, this is about you as a person, this is a character judgment or a character assassination, versus this is a behavior, and I think it's so much easier when we frame things as behaviors. Those things we can work on. But I think the problem is when we don't get feedback, it's really easy for us to believe that something is about someone's character, that's something that can't change.

   10. SSSimon Sinek15:06

       And you receive it as such.

   11. ASAlex Simon15:07

       Yeah. I think it's something like the brain remembers n- something negative four times more than it remembers something positive. Like, when I think of feedback, I often think of people telling me things that were really hard to hear that I needed to work on, and that probably is because, like, when someone says, "Oh, I don't like this presentation that you did," the way that I'm interpreting it is like, "Oh, my God. I'm not leadership material," or like, "Oh, I, I can't do this," or, "Oh, I'm unworthy," or, "What if they don't want me to be on their team?" Where I'm not like, "Oh, interesting. Okay, let me make these, let me make these changes to the presentation." You mentioned power dynamics earlier. I think that those are also really intense, especially in this realm. We can be quite fearful about telling someone something when we're in a position of authority, and it's super hard to tell someone to, to give feedback up, especially when the person's not asking. There are inherent power dynamics to this, and the impact asymmetry of feedback is, is so intense. Like, something that a supervisor can say in an offhanded way can be the thing that keeps someone else wide awake at night for three weeks.

   12. SSSimon Sinek16:03

       Mm-hmm.

   13. ASAlex Simon16:04

       Um, that's a lot of pressure.

   14. SSSimon Sinek16:05

       The concept of a whisper becomes a shout, and I always remind people who start to climb the corporate ladder, you have to remember that whispers become shouts.

   15. ASAlex Simon16:12

       Yeah.

   16. SSSimon Sinek16:13

       You, you're the same person. It's by virtue of the social, the social hierarchies, and in this case, formal hierarchies. So as you said, an offhanded comment could make someone's day or destroy their week. A joke that would be fine to make when you're just one of the, one of the colleagues, you can no longer make that joke 'cause you're in a, in a position of authority now and, and the rules are different.

   17. ASAlex Simon16:30

       And combine that with the feeling of, "Oh, my God. This is a verdict on my character."

   18. SSSimon Sinek16:34

       Right.

   19. ASAlex Simon16:35

       That, that's, that compounds.

   20. SSSimon Sinek16:36

       Right.

   21. ASAlex Simon16:37

       That's why it can feel so intense.

   22. SSSimon Sinek16:38

       Right.

   23. ASAlex Simon16:38

       And so, yeah, we're worried about hurting people's feelings 'cause we often can h- hurt people's feelings, and so then we avoid saying things that are true that could ironically help the person feel better every

8. 16:46 – 22:28

   Spears: The Culture-Changing Feedback Mechanism

   1. ASAlex Simon16:46

      single day.

   2. SSSimon Sinek16:46

      Let's talk about how to give feedback and how to receive feedback. We've talked about this in one of the other episodes, but I think it's worth repeating 'cause it's, it's, it's, A, it's brilliant, and B, um, it's been sh- we've implemented it. It's been hugely powerful, um, in our company is this concept of spears. Again, something I learned from the Air Force. Here's a scenario, you know, pretty fairly common. Somebody will work two weeks on their PowerPoint in the corporate world, and they'll come in and they'll give the big presentation, and at the end, they're like, "Eh?"

   3. ASAlex Simon17:13

      Ta-da. [laughs]

   4. SSSimon Sinek17:13

      "Pretty good, right? Pretty good, right?" And I was in a meeting in the Air Force and somebody came in. They'd worked really hard on their presentation for two weeks. You know, they, and they came in and they gave their presentation, and at the end of the presentation, they went, "Spears?" And what they meant was, "Here's my work. Throw spears at it. Make it better." And it was just part of their culture, this idea of, make my work better, please.

   5. ASAlex Simon17:36

      Mm.

   6. SSSimon Sinek17:37

      And I found it so remarkable because it was, A, depersonalized, right? 'Cause usually when we give, so many of us in private sector, when people criticize our work or compliment our work, we take it personally. Like, they said my work is good. That's 'cause I'm awesome. They said my work is bad. Oh, my God. They hate me. Right? Which, of course, is not true, at least not most of the time.

   7. ASAlex Simon17:56

      Yeah, yeah.

   8. SSSimon Sinek17:57

      Sometimes, [laughs] sometimes it's true. And so I brought this story back to our company, and we started doing it. So somebody would give a presentation or somebody would lay out their work or their plan, and at the end, they would say, "Spears?" And people would say, "This doesn't work. That doesn't add up. Have you considered this?" And the person would be like, "Yep. This is good. This is good." Th- the, the simple mechanism w- made it so It was brilliant. And, and it even became a way to give criticism when it wasn't a formal scenario. So somebody's like, "Here's my idea." And somebody goes, "Can I give you a spear?" And you'd be like, "Yeah, yeah, go ahead." And so we now have this culture where all work, you, people ask for spears, like always. And the amazing thing, it has been completely depersonalized that everybody knows that we're in this together, that the spears are being thrown to make the work better or help me see things I can't see, and it helps people not take it personally. It's been one of the best things we've ever implemented in the company.

   9. ASAlex Simon18:53

      Wow.

   10. SSSimon Sinek18:53

       And it happens all the time. So this is one of those mechanisms where feedback isn't necessarily a session. This is, this is literally every time an idea or a piece of work is proposed-

   11. ASAlex Simon19:01

       Mm-hmm

   12. SSSimon Sinek19:01

       ... that spears are available.

   13. ASAlex Simon19:03

       Mm-hmm. It sounds like feedback is seen as the source of information that helps you improve things.

   14. SSSimon Sinek19:07

       Yes. And the best thing about it is people who maybe formerly struggled with receiving feedback because they took it personally, they didn't know how to take it, even people who weren't that good at giving it, like we now have a culture where people crave-

   15. ASAlex Simon19:21

       Yeah

   16. SSSimon Sinek19:22

       ... the spears. They're like, "What do you think of my work?" "It's great." "No, no, no, no, spears please." Like, "Give me spears because I want your help to make my work better." They're all turning into little Alex Simons.

   17. ASAlex Simon19:33

       [laughs] I feel like I-

   18. SSSimon Sinek19:34

       [laughs]

   19. ASAlex Simon19:35

       So I teach emotional intelligence at Yale, and l- my favorite thing that anyone [laughs] of my students has written in any evaluation I've ever gotten was about feedback. So every single week, a- after every class, I email all of my students and I say, "Please do, if you will, fill out this feedback form. What did you like in today's class and what could be improved?" And I ask a couple questions. At the end of the semester in my course evaluations, one of my students wrote, "If there was anything you didn't like about this class, then that's on you because Alex asked for feedback every single week." [laughs] She implemented all the changes that we asked for. It's not true, I didn't implement all the changes, but I certainly tried my best.

   20. SSSimon Sinek20:05

       It's not about implementing, it's about being heard.

   21. ASAlex Simon20:08

       Yeah. It's about taking other people into consideration and figuring out what's in your blind spots.

   22. SSSimon Sinek20:13

       Mm.

   23. ASAlex Simon20:14

       I often think that there are really small changes that people can make, leaders and also just everyone on teams can make, that will make everyone else's lives feel better.

   24. SSSimon Sinek20:24

       Yeah.

   25. ASAlex Simon20:24

       It's like the thing that people are side-barring, texting me like, "Oh my God, can you believe that he just did this and that?" It's like, well, no one's telling him.

   26. SSSimon Sinek20:30

       Yeah.

   27. ASAlex Simon20:30

       So how is he supposed to fix it?

   28. SSSimon Sinek20:31

       Yeah.

   29. ASAlex Simon20:31

       I'm obsessed with the fact that all of the things, all of the information about how I can grow and improve is oft-

   30. SSSimon Sinek20:36

       In the room
9. 22:28 – 27:16

   FBI: The Three-Part Formula for Giving Difficult Feedback

   1. SSSimon Sinek22:28

      And it's just a technique to give feedback in a way that other people can hear it and take accountability, right? It can be about anything. It stands for feelings, behavior, and impact. How do I feel? What is the behavior that you performed that made me feel this way? And if the behavior doesn't change, what will be the impact? You can do it in any order, and we've gamed it out with t- just like permutations of all the twos and it doesn't work. You have to do all three. Again, the order doesn't matter, but you have to do all three. And the consideration for FBI is the feedback you give has to be based on something specific. So general feedback doesn't work. Like you're always late to meetings.

   2. ASAlex Simon23:04

      Mm.

   3. SSSimon Sinek23:04

      Because they'll tell you the one time that they weren't late to the meeting, and you're like, " [sighs] Yes, that time you weren't." And they're like, "Well, then what's the problem?"

   4. ASAlex Simon23:11

      Yeah.

   5. SSSimon Sinek23:11

      Right? Well, every other time. But I wasn't that time, and it, it, it derails it. And even if it is repetitive behavior, you choose the most egregious or the most recent for the, for the behavior you want to demonstrate. And you should always prepare your FBI statement before you do it. It should never be done on the fly. So it could sound th- something like, "I'm concerned," okay? Um, "When you came to the meeting late on Thursday, it made the rest of us feel like, um, we were less important to you than anything else you're doing. And my fear is that if you continue to come to meetings late, it, it will real- have serious implications for morale."

   6. ASAlex Simon23:51

      Mm.

   7. SSSimon Sinek23:52

      And then you shut up and you go into listening mode. If they get defensive or deny it, the reason you've written it down and you know it before you go in is you can't get flustered or take the bait. And if they start getting into so like, "Well, I need to talk to you about the time that you..." You're like-

   8. ASAlex Simon24:07

      Talk later

   9. SSSimon Sinek24:07

      ... "Let's talk about that later."

   10. ASAlex Simon24:08

       Yeah.

   11. SSSimon Sinek24:08

       Want to hear your feedback. Right now what I want to talk about is I'm concerned because on Thursday when you showed up to the meeting late... And you simply repeat the statement.

   12. ASAlex Simon24:16

       Yes.

   13. SSSimon Sinek24:16

       And what it's designed to do is make somebody take accountability. It's designed to make somebody listen, right? It works really, really well On the some occasions that things get out of hand, you end the feedback session. You say, "This isn't... Clearly, this is the wrong time. This is, this is no longer constructive. Why don't we try and revisit this again another time?" But the minute they start talking, "Oh, I hate being late to meetings," you immediately become the listener. Even though that you are the one giving the feedback, you then become the therapist. They say, "I hate being late to meetings." "S- tell me more." "It's something that, it's chronic. I, I didn't know that it was affecting the team so badly, but I, you have to understand, I struggle." "Go on. What else?"

   14. ASAlex Simon24:56

       Mm.

   15. SSSimon Sinek24:57

       And you just let them go through it, and you let them solve their own problem. They'll be like, "You know, I should probably just, like, put it in my schedule. That would probably be better, and I can set the alarm and schedule." "Go on. What else?" "Well, I think that would really help." "Okay. I'm really g- glad you gave me this feedback. Thank you." You know?

   16. ASAlex Simon25:11

       Mm-hmm.

   17. SSSimon Sinek25:11

       And that's what it's designed to do. The best thing about FBI is it works fantastic for positive feedback as well.

   18. ASAlex Simon25:16

       Yeah.

   19. SSSimon Sinek25:16

       It makes positive feedback even more powerful than just saying, "Hey, good job."

   20. ASAlex Simon25:20

       Yeah.

   21. SSSimon Sinek25:20

       Like, "I am so beyond inspired. On Thursday, that presentation that you gave was so good, and the effort that you put in was so clear. I know that if you continue to do work like that, that this company and your career skyrocket like rocket ship."

   22. ASAlex Simon25:39

       Yeah, I feel amazing even though-

   23. SSSimon Sinek25:40

       You know?

   24. ASAlex Simon25:40

       ... that's fake. [laughs]

   25. SSSimon Sinek25:41

       [laughs] Right?

   26. ASAlex Simon25:42

       Well, it worked. Yeah.

   27. SSSimon Sinek25:43

       But d- doing all three really makes feel s- someone feel good.

   28. ASAlex Simon25:47

       And it also helps positively reinforce the behaviors that you want to see more of. Like, vague praise like, "Great job last week." I don't know what, what I did well.

   29. SSSimon Sinek25:53

       Yeah.

   30. ASAlex Simon25:54

       You know? Like, if, if great job on this, this, and that, it's like, "Oh, great. Now I know I can do more of that."
10. 27:16 – 34:10

    Recognition Languages: How Different People Want to Be Celebrated

    1. ASAlex Simon27:16

       Yeah. I'm think systems of recognition are one of the lowest lift and most powerful ways to help people grow. Like, to positively reinforce behaviors as opposed to only negatively reinforce-

    2. SSSimon Sinek27:25

       Yeah

    3. ASAlex Simon27:26

       ... behaviors. There... I heard this thing probably 10 years ago that I still think about all the time, which is this idea that credit is free. You can always give people credit. You can give them recognition. You don't n- you know, it doesn't need to be anything financial. You can always out of the abundance of your heart just say, like, "Hey, great job on this thing," or like, "I just want to celebrate so and so because they did an incredible job on this." I think it goes against what a lot of us think, which is that credit is a scarce resource. Like, oh, you-

    4. SSSimon Sinek27:49

       Yeah

    5. ASAlex Simon27:49

       ... get credit, or I get credit, as opposed to kind of like celebrating your piece of it, also uplifting my piece of it and recognizing everyone. I think a lot of people know about love languages, like acts of service, gifts, all of the quality time, all of those. I think there should also be recognition languages. Like, there are different ways-

    6. SSSimon Sinek28:04

       Amen

    7. ASAlex Simon28:04

       ... yeah, that you like to re- be recognized and praised versus how I like to be recognized.

    8. SSSimon Sinek28:07

       Amen.

    9. ASAlex Simon28:08

       Yeah.

    10. SSSimon Sinek28:08

        100%. And the irony is, is people generally know.

    11. ASAlex Simon28:12

        Yeah.

    12. SSSimon Sinek28:12

        Like, people know how they like to receive criticism, and people know how they like to be complimented or, um, celebrated.

    13. ASAlex Simon28:18

        I think another one is kind of public praise-

    14. SSSimon Sinek28:21

        Public praise

    15. ASAlex Simon28:21

        ... of, like, a channel on Slack where it's like, "So and So did this thing. You know, celebration emoji."

    16. SSSimon Sinek28:27

        Right.

    17. ASAlex Simon28:28

        [laughs] Yeah. And everyone's like, "Yay."

    18. SSSimon Sinek28:30

        I think acts of service for some, like-

    19. ASAlex Simon28:32

        Yeah

    20. SSSimon Sinek28:33

        ... "Hey, you did a great job. Take a day off."

    21. ASAlex Simon28:36

        Mm-hmm.

    22. SSSimon Sinek28:37

        Or awards for some, like, "Here's a trophy."

    23. ASAlex Simon28:39

        I think private recognition also.

    24. SSSimon Sinek28:41

        Yeah.

    25. ASAlex Simon28:41

        That can go in both ways, right? Like, either your supervisor complimenting you or also someone you supervise.

    26. SSSimon Sinek28:47

        Yeah.

    27. ASAlex Simon28:47

        You know? Like, I was talking to a friend of mine the other day and he said, "Yeah, you know, I, I got a raise at work, and also I got this letter that my supervisee wrote me about how I make him feel-

    28. SSSimon Sinek28:56

        Yeah

    29. ASAlex Simon28:56

        ... on the team, and this thing made me cry."

    30. SSSimon Sinek28:58

        Yeah.
11. 34:10 – 39:52

    How to Schedule Feedback into Your Routine

    1. SSSimon Sinek34:10

       wrong.

    2. ASAlex Simon34:10

       Yeah. That reminds me of, like, the number one thing that I feel strongly about, about feedback, which is to have feedback, to do it regularly, to take it seriously, to make it a habit. For me, I can't imagine working with someone directly and not having feedback at least every other week. That's just me personally, but I'm also an extreme. I really, really, really care about learning and growing as a person, and I really care about making sure that everyone on my team knows that I deeply am invested in their learning and growing.

    3. SSSimon Sinek34:34

       So how do you do it? If you do it weekly or, or bi-weekly, what is the format?

    4. ASAlex Simon34:38

       It's a meeting. I do it typically on Fridays every other week. Every Friday I wanna push it because it's not, like, directly, it's not directly tied to any output. So al- always there's gonna be something that I want, I feel that I wanna prioritize over it, but I always prioritize it.

    5. SSSimon Sinek34:52

       Ah. Ah.

    6. ASAlex Simon34:53

       Even though it's not urgent, it's important.

    7. SSSimon Sinek34:55

       Got it. So you, because you have to do work, you're always like, "Ugh, I could always cancel the feedback session."

    8. ASAlex Simon34:58

       Totally. That is a thing that enables, that greases the wheels of doing all the work.

    9. SSSimon Sinek35:02

       I'm gonna use your terminology. It's preventative medicine.

    10. ASAlex Simon35:04

        Yeah.

    11. SSSimon Sinek35:04

        It's really easy to, you know, start eating healthy tomorrow and cancel the workout today 'cause I have work to do, but if you keep canceling the workout because of work, you die of a heart attack.

    12. ASAlex Simon35:12

        Yeah, exactly.

    13. SSSimon Sinek35:13

        Right. Okay. So this is-

    14. ASAlex Simon35:14

        So first of all, I do it.

    15. SSSimon Sinek35:15

        Okay.

    16. ASAlex Simon35:15

        Like, that's the most important thing. I prioritize it and I do it regularly. So for me-

    17. SSSimon Sinek35:18

        Okay. That's, that's a big one.

    18. ASAlex Simon35:19

        Yeah. The next thing is that I think about it in advance. So I have a series of questions that I answer. So let's take with my chief of staff. She has a series of questions and I have a series of questions. I can give you an example.

    19. SSSimon Sinek35:29

        Her for you and you for her.

    20. ASAlex Simon35:31

        Yeah. It's often the same ones. It'll probably take me 20 to 30 minutes to prepare, which is a lot of time.

    21. SSSimon Sinek35:35

        That's a lot of time, yeah.

    22. ASAlex Simon35:36

        And I'll, we, we will answer something like what is your summary of the last two weeks? What did I think I did well? What did I think I can improve on? What did I think she did well? What did I think she can improve on? And then we go through. First we start with one of us, and then we go through the other one, and it's incredible. We've come up with systems and what are ways that we can improve all the things that we said we wanna improve on. And then at the end I always ask, "What are you afraid to tell me?"

    23. SSSimon Sinek35:58

        What was the last thing she was afraid to tell you? You had something in your teeth?

    24. ASAlex Simon36:01

        [laughs]

    25. SSSimon Sinek36:03

        [laughs]

    26. ASAlex Simon36:03

        Sh- I think she said she's afraid to tell me, uh, how much she's working because she's afraid to let me down, and then I could show, like, communicate to her how much she's not letting me down and how I'm grateful for her every single day, which is true.

    27. SSSimon Sinek36:17

        Do you know what I like about your system there? We used to do 360s, and the format we used, we sort of came up with it ourselves. Your team was not the people who were like, "This is the marketing team." You, the group that came into the room were the people you work with regularly.

    28. ASAlex Simon36:31

        Mm-hmm.

    29. SSSimon Sinek36:32

        So, you know, sales may work with somebody in marketing who may work with somebody in whatever, tech. So whoever you have regular contact with, that's, that's the group that came into the room. And everybody had to fill out a form in advance that said, what are the five specific examples of weaknesses or areas of improvement, five specific examples of, um, strengths or areas that I have improved. And, um, everybody filled out their own form. The forms were distributed and collated, and then when you came in, we'd go around the room and we would take turns, and you would read your form to everybody.

    30. ASAlex Simon37:06

        Wow.
12. 39:52 – 42:34

    The Collaboration Meeting: Preventing Problems Before They Start

    1. SSSimon Sinek39:52

       What else?

    2. ASAlex Simon39:52

       The one that I really love, this is also when I first start working with someone, is I have a collaboration meeting with them. This is something that someone did to me, someone who I was working on a project with maybe five years ago. She said, "Do you wanna sit down? I have all these questions before we start working together. I just wanna like..." It's kind of like a stylistic check, it's an alignment check, and it's figuring out what are our strengths. And so she sent me all these questions. The questions were things like, "What are three things that support you in a working relationship? What are activities that drain you? What, what is your style of giving and receiving feedback? What does, like, a typical day look like in your working life?" It was both really high level and also got quite granular.

    3. SSSimon Sinek40:26

       Mm.

    4. ASAlex Simon40:26

       And I answered all these questions. We had this meeting.

    5. SSSimon Sinek40:28

       Was this your onboarding?

    6. ASAlex Simon40:29

       This was part of our decision to work together, is like we, okay, we, we wanted to work on a project together. I mean, now I do it as onboarding when I hire people.

    7. SSSimon Sinek40:36

       That's amazing.

    8. ASAlex Simon40:37

       Yeah. It's like part of the interview process.

    9. SSSimon Sinek40:38

       Yeah, yeah.

    10. ASAlex Simon40:39

        Yeah. So I will interview someone, and if I want them to do the job, then I'll have a collaboration meeting. And so be like, "Okay, what do you love to do? What do I love to do? Are our skill sets complementary? Are our values aligned?" And it's truly incredible because it gives an opportunity to surface things that will one day become problems.

    11. SSSimon Sinek40:54

        Yeah, yeah, yeah.

    12. ASAlex Simon40:55

        So for example, when I first started my company, I met someone and we decided we wanted to be business partners. But he was in his 40s, he had already sold two companies. He, like, loved what I was doing, and he wanted to do it together, but he was not gonna put in the work.

    13. SSSimon Sinek41:10

        Yeah.

    14. ASAlex Simon41:10

        And so we had this meeting. I said, "What are you afraid to tell me?" And he said, "I'm afraid to tell you that I really don't wanna work that hard." [laughs]

    15. SSSimon Sinek41:17

        [laughs]

    16. ASAlex Simon41:18

        And I thought about it and I was like, that is totally fair. Yeah, you're not gonna work that hard.

    17. SSSimon Sinek41:22

        Yeah.

    18. ASAlex Simon41:22

        Like, if I'm picking you as a business partner, you're not gonna be in the day-to-day with me.

    19. SSSimon Sinek41:26

        Yeah.

    20. ASAlex Simon41:26

        And then I could think about it, decide if that was for me. Turned out I was down. It worked well for us because-

    21. SSSimon Sinek41:31

        Because it came up. Because it was known.

    22. ASAlex Simon41:33

        Be- exactly.

    23. SSSimon Sinek41:33

        It was a known quantity.

    24. ASAlex Simon41:34

        Whereas if we hadn't, if I hadn't known that-

    25. SSSimon Sinek41:36

        Yeah

    26. ASAlex Simon41:36

        ... every single day I would've been like, "Why aren't you doing this?"

    27. SSSimon Sinek41:38

        Right.

    28. ASAlex Simon41:38

        Like, "Why am I doing this all alone?"

    29. SSSimon Sinek41:39

        And he either gets defensive or, or shames.

    30. ASAlex Simon41:42

        Yeah. So that's another thing that I like to do is, like, the preventative work of feedback even before I start working is, like, naming what are all the things that are gonna get in our way.
13. 42:34 – 49:08

    The Air Force Commander Who Learned When NOT to Give Feedback

    1. SSSimon Sinek42:34

       She got promoted to senior leadership, she got her first command And she was deployed for 365 days to the Middle East. Any one of those is, is, is hard, and all three happened at the same time. And the command she was given, she was in charge of Balad Air Base for base operations. So housing, mess hall, food, uh, laundry, morale events on the, on base. Like, she was in charge of all of that, and the previous two or three commanders had all been fired, but for, for doing a bad job, right? She's a hardcore, you know, high performer. "I'm gonna blow the, you know, the doors off. I'm gonna be the one that succeeds. Me, me, me, I'm gonna get it done. Watch me. I'm a star," right? And she shows up, and it's an unmitigated disaster. Nobody's taking her seriously. She's, she's in charge of soldiers and airmen who are more seasoned than she is, bigger than she is, older than she is. They're ignoring her, even though she's the commanding officer. And she admitted that for six months she cried herself to sleep every single night.

    2. ASAlex Simon43:34

       Mm-hmm.

    3. SSSimon Sinek43:35

       And it was going so badly she just regretted being there, didn't wanna l- be in the Air Force. All she wanted to do was go home. And after about six months, she resigned herself to the fact that she had failed, and she accepted the failure, and she changed her strategy. She said, "Well, I failed, so I'm not gonna even bother trying to do all the things I said I was gonna do. Instead, what I'm gonna do is everybody here is away from their families. Everybody here is under a lot of stress. I'm just gonna work really, really hard to help everybody just enjoy their time while they're here." And something happened. All of a sudden things started to go really, really well. The way she adjusted doing things just because of she had this new strategy of helping people rather than being a, being successful. After the next six months, she ended up being a huge success, completely turned things around, and everybody missed her when she left. And one of the things she learned in this change of strategy was when to give feedback. So when we're obsessed with making the machine be the higher performing machine, we give feedback at the time things happen. So, for example, you've organized a big corporate event, right? And they put the coffee table far away from the cups and the cookies. Even if you do it nicely, you're like, "Hey, move the coffee over there," right? Catching things and fixing them in the middle of the situation, and that's what she used to do. She'd be like, "Move this to there. Don't forget that." Especially even in the middle of fun things, she'd be correcting. And she thinks because she's trying to make it higher performing, work better. And what it did is it ruined it for people. They're in it. It's going. People are stressed. They're taking their job seriously, and she just kept ruining it. When she changed from, changed her strategy to, like, "I just want people to, like, do well, have a good time," you know, she wouldn't give the feedback in the middle unless it was, like, serious, serious, serious. But that was rare, right? She wouldn't give the feedback in the middle. She would do it at the end. She'd be like, "All right. Event was great. It's over. Let's just go through what we can do better next time. Hey, the cups and the coffee were really far apart from each other. I noticed that was really annoying for people. Next one, make sure the cups are next to the coffee." People are like, "Got it, got it, got it." And this profound little change of when we give feedback, and I started adopting it. Make notes, you know? Make little notes. Keep 'em, keep 'em with you. Instead of giving feedback in the middle of the presentation, wait till the end. Instead of giving feedback in the middle of the event, wait till the end. Because you're ruining, you're ruining somebody's flow. You're ruining their fun. You're ruining the fact that they take their job seriously and they're trying to do hard work. There's a time and a place, and that time and place is not the time you have the thought of the-

    4. ASAlex Simon46:13

       Yeah

    5. SSSimon Sinek46:13

       ... feedback.

    6. ASAlex Simon46:13

       I totally agree, and I would even underscore one of the things that you did automatically is, is you, even as you were giving the example, "Okay, the cup's over here, the table's over there. Next time let's do it like this." Like, it wasn't like, "This was bad." It's, it's growth oriented. Yeah.

    7. SSSimon Sinek46:26

       You want the affirmative language for the growth orientation. 100% agree.

    8. ASAlex Simon46:30

       Yeah.

    9. SSSimon Sinek46:30

       Yes, but still it's not-

    10. ASAlex Simon46:31

        And it's not fixated on what already happened, the thing that we can't change.

    11. SSSimon Sinek46:34

        Right.

    12. ASAlex Simon46:34

        It's like, "Oh, we learned this thing. Next time let's do it like this."

    13. SSSimon Sinek46:37

        Yes.

    14. ASAlex Simon46:37

        And you still get the, the result that you want.

    15. SSSimon Sinek46:39

        And she was wildly successful as a result. I, I actually learned the story when she got back from deployment, and I sat down with her probably a week or two right after she got back, so all the emotions were super raw.

    16. ASAlex Simon46:51

        Yeah.

    17. SSSimon Sinek46:51

        And, um, she tells me the whole story about crying herself to sleep and everything, and I... She gets to the end of the story. I said, "So what did you learn?" And she starts crying, and she says, "I've never had such a profound feeling of having a positive impact in people's lives like I did from that experience."

    18. ASAlex Simon47:10

        Mm-hmm.

    19. SSSimon Sinek47:11

        And it wasn't about her success, and it wasn't about her metrics, and it wasn't about... It was about a leader's decision to take care of their people-

    20. ASAlex Simon47:18

        Yeah

    21. SSSimon Sinek47:19

        ... to learn how to give feedback in a more constructive and positive way, and the result was performance through the roof. I think you and I have been sort of dancing around the point here, which is if you learn how to give feedback, if you learn how to receive feedback, if you learn how to crave criticism and negative feedback, if you learn how to ask for feedback, if you learn how you like to receive recognition, if you learn how you like to receive criticism and you tell somebody what they don't know so that you can get it in the way that you need to hear it, the result is you love work, you feel psychologically safe, your performance is through the roof, the company's performance is through the roof, and everybody, quote unquote, "wins."

    22. ASAlex Simon48:01

        Mm-hmm.

    23. SSSimon Sinek48:02

        If you choose to ignore all of these things because we're a performance organization and blah, blah, blah, right? You will accidentally break the machine and burn your people out.

    24. ASAlex Simon48:10

        I love that. It's such a beautiful story, and I totally agree.

    25. SSSimon Sinek48:13

        Talking about feedback is like talking about exercise or talking about eating well, which is the results don't happen immediately.

    26. ASAlex Simon48:22

        Mm-hmm.

    27. SSSimon Sinek48:22

        And it is a muscle that you have to build, and it is a practice that you have to work on, and it is something that you need to ask other people to watch your form because sometimes you're not good at it.

    28. ASAlex Simon48:32

        Mm-hmm.

    29. SSSimon Sinek48:33

        You know? Am I bending my back? No, keep your back straight. Okay, thanks. 'Cause you can't see yourself. That's what feedback is. I cannot see myself.

    30. ASAlex Simon48:39

        Yeah [laughs] .
14. 49:08 – 52:57

    Building the Feedback Muscle: From Painful to Empowering

    1. SSSimon Sinek49:08

       I'm curious what you've learned in your practice about how we can learn to receive criticism better, feedback better. Like, how do we build that muscle to receive, learn how to receive, or learn how we receive?

    2. ASAlex Simon49:21

       Yeah, 'cause it's not just giving feedback, it's also receiving.

    3. SSSimon Sinek49:23

       Yeah.

    4. ASAlex Simon49:23

       Yeah.

    5. SSSimon Sinek49:23

       It's both.

    6. ASAlex Simon49:24

       We kind of talked about it earlier, but for me, the most important, the most important thing is to ask for it. I ask for it regularly. I ask for it big and small. I always say, "What are big things but are really hard to say, and then also what are small things that I can improve?" I ask as many people as possible. I'm obsessed with asking for feedback, and I ask for it like I mean it. You know, there's a way to ask for it where you're kind of just giving it lip service, and everyone can feel that, and they won't actually give it to you. And so I ask for it. When I receive it, I get curious about it. It's not just, like, hearing the first thing that someone says. I'll ask questions until I genuinely understand.

    7. SSSimon Sinek49:54

       You receive the feedback and listen to understand.

    8. ASAlex Simon49:56

       Yeah.

    9. SSSimon Sinek49:57

       Mm-hmm.

    10. ASAlex Simon49:57

        I receive the feedback. I listen to understand. I get excited about it. Like, like what you're talking about of, like, craving it is, "Oh my, this is the, this is the information that I need in order to get better, in order to fix this thing, in order to improve this thing."

    11. SSSimon Sinek50:08

        It's like an endorphin rush when you start exercising. Like-

    12. ASAlex Simon50:11

        Yeah

    13. SSSimon Sinek50:11

        ... you start really wanting it.

    14. ASAlex Simon50:12

        Yeah.

    15. SSSimon Sinek50:12

        Yeah.

    16. ASAlex Simon50:13

        That's another one. And also I try to model for other people how to receive it. So I, I always express my gratitude first thing, even if I disagree with it or even if I know it's valid but I can't implement it, 'cause I have a picture that sometimes the person giving the feedback doesn't-

    17. SSSimon Sinek50:26

        Yeah

    18. ASAlex Simon50:26

        ... they can't see the full picture. So maybe they're telling me something, it's true, and it's not changeable. I'm still like, "Thank you so much. I'll think about it."

    19. SSSimon Sinek50:32

        When people give me re- s- feedback, I first tell them that they're wrong.

    20. ASAlex Simon50:37

        [laughs]

    21. SSSimon Sinek50:39

        [laughs]

    22. ASAlex Simon50:39

        I mean, sometimes, you're joking, but that's it.

    23. SSSimon Sinek50:40

        Unless, unless, unless it's positive, then I tell them that they're right. [laughs]

    24. ASAlex Simon50:43

        [laughs] Of course. But you're jo- it's real though. You know, like, 'cause I got feedback last week. I just ran a month-long program-

    25. SSSimon Sinek50:49

        [laughs]

    26. ASAlex Simon50:49

        ... and as I am want to do, I ask for feedback after every single class. And at the end, someone who didn't fill out her feedback form the whole time gave me a piece of feedback at the end that was about the structure of the program, and I got a little defensive, or I'd got frustrated. It's like, okay, well now it's too late. I said, "Thank you so much." I sat with it. I tried to hear what actually the information was, even though it was too late and I was still frustrated. It's okay to be frustrated. And then I tried to figure out what can I do to repair. What is something that I can tangibly do? 'Cause it's one thing to say... Sometimes there's nothing you can do, and then other times it's like, okay, well, this person is feeling this way. What are other ways that I can make it up to them? And not being shy about trying to get creative.

    27. SSSimon Sinek51:23

        Mm.

    28. ASAlex Simon51:23

        And I think that's another one. And so especially as leaders, modeling how we want feedback to be received is also helpful for other people who we're giving feedback to. If we can show that we're curious and open and grateful and excited to receive it-

    29. SSSimon Sinek51:36

        Mm-hmm, mm-hmm

    30. ASAlex Simon51:36

        ... then that also creates a psychological safety for when we give it, and so it becomes this beautiful cycle between people.
15. 52:57 – 57:45

    One Simple Question: What Can I Do Better?

    1. ASAlex Simon52:57

       Yeah.

    2. SSSimon Sinek52:57

       Right? And it's a, there's a very simple way to get into that habit-

    3. ASAlex Simon53:00

       Mm

    4. SSSimon Sinek53:01

       ... which is no matter what, you know, if somebody pays you the compliment, because everybody loves a compliment, no matter what you do, even if somebody offers you nothing, you do a presentation, everybody's like, "Thanks for the presentation," and you walk out of the meeting, get in the habit of saying, "Hey, what can I do better?" Not, "Tell me what was good and what was bad." "What can I do better?" Because you're asking for it, it eliminates the fear, the discomfort. It opens the door to it.

    5. ASAlex Simon53:22

       Yeah.

    6. SSSimon Sinek53:22

       And what starts to happen is you start craving the feedback because it's making you better. It's making you more aware.

    7. ASAlex Simon53:28

       Yeah.

    8. SSSimon Sinek53:28

       And it's, it's really funny how even somebody who, like, is uncomfortable getting negative feedback or somebody who really, like, really likes positive feedback, you actually, you start craving the criticism because you, you're getting better and stronger.

    9. ASAlex Simon53:42

       Yeah.

    10. SSSimon Sinek53:42

        It's wonderful.

    11. ASAlex Simon53:43

        Yeah.

    12. SSSimon Sinek53:44

        It's wonderful.

    13. ASAlex Simon53:45

        We've talked about so many different things. I don't even know how to begin to summarize it. First of all, we have some big picture things.

    14. SSSimon Sinek53:50

        Yeah.

    15. ASAlex Simon53:50

        We talked about feedback as preventative care-

    16. SSSimon Sinek53:52

        Yes

    17. ASAlex Simon53:52

        ... about the kind of, like, food in your teeth phenomenon. You had a m- a few amazing examples about culture of feedback, of, like, Spears as a culture and recognition, recog- being able to recognize each other, remember that credit is free, and figuring out how to recognize people in the way that they act, that actually lands and impacts them. Those are cultural ones. But I think also we talked about a lot of ones that even if you're not in a culture that values feedback, you can also implement it in your working relationships. For me, the m- the most important thing, if people are gonna leave with one thing, it's to do it, to care about it, to prioritize it, to put thought into it, and literally to do it semi- regularly, ideally every two weeks. Do it once you start working with someone, and I also do it before. But then we also, okay, with giving, we had FBI.

    18. SSSimon Sinek54:33

        Which is a technique for how to have a difficult conversation, how to have a, how, how to, how to give feedback in a m- in a way that is more likely to be received.

    19. ASAlex Simon54:41

        So it's feelings, behavior, impact.

    20. SSSimon Sinek54:42

        Yep.

    21. ASAlex Simon54:43

        Yeah.

    22. SSSimon Sinek54:43

        Any order, but you have to have all three.

    23. ASAlex Simon54:45

        We had timing.

    24. SSSimon Sinek54:45

        Yep. Both checking in with somebody when they want to receive it.

    25. ASAlex Simon54:48

        Mm-hmm.

    26. SSSimon Sinek54:48

        "Do you wanna do it now? You wanna schedule it?" And if it's an event, unless it's mission critical, um, save it for the end-

    27. ASAlex Simon54:55

        Mm-hmm

    28. SSSimon Sinek54:55

        ... for the debrief.

    29. ASAlex Simon54:56

        Yeah. And we also had asking people how they wanna receive feedback and giving them options. And then for receiving feedback Ask for it

    30. SSSimon Sinek55:03

        Ask for it

Episode duration: 57:46