Getting Feedback for Leaders Part 1

Feedback, as they say, is the breakfast of champions.  As leaders, it is critical to get feedback from a variety of sources both formally and informally.  Feedback keeps you grounded, provides opportunities for improvement and also endears people to you as a leader.

The funny thing about feedback is that the higher you get promoted in a company the less credible feedback you get, particularly from your reports or from folks ‘beneath’ you.  It is the old scenario of who is going to tell the emperor that he is wearing no cloths.

And let’s be real honest, you know you have “made it” in your career when you tell a really bad joke and people are compelled to laugh at it no matter how terrible it is.

And although this might seem flattering, it really opens you up to having potential blind spots not only in your leadership but in employees willing to tell you the truth on how the business is going.

We will focus our attention on how leaders can get robust and helpful feedback over the next few blog posts.  Without good feedback you will either miss an opportunity to improve your leadership capacity or be oblivious to something that you really need to know about in the organization.