Turn that Frown Upside Down!

It is time for many of you to deliver the dreaded performance evaluations to your team members. It seems like no one enjoys this yearly task. Managers don’t like writing up the forms and delivering the news and the team members either dislike the ratings or walk away with no real feedback.

Performance evaluations are a critical part of the work experience. They provide insight into the areas where the employee is excelling and feedback on opportunities to become even more effective. In some cases, they are tied to promotions or bonuses that can impact the employee and their family for many years to come. So, these dreaded events are a big deal with real consequences.

When I worked at AEP, we engaged in a journey to positively impact our culture. One of the things we discovered through our survey process was that few of our team members were satisfied with the feedback they received during the annual performance evaluation process. Our CEO Nick Akins committed to changing the performance evaluation process by ensuring that employees received a quality evaluation which included a review about half way through the year so that there were no surprises related to lagging performance at the end of the year. In addition, leaders with direct reports received feedback from their direct reports, peers and their supervisor. 

Our partner in the culture journey was Senn Delaney. They suggested an innovative way to deliver performance feedback that I have used with great results. The model looks like this:

What I (we) appreciate about you is…

AND

I believe that you can be even more effective if…

William James said, “The deepest craving of human nature is the need to be appreciated.” So, we begin the conversation with what we appreciate about the performance of the team member. That is certainly not unique and most of you try to begin the conversation with a positive discussion.

Generally, things go south in the traditional approach by the use of the word “BUT” following the positive feedback. The word “BUT” signals the beginning of the negative information and most people stop listening at that point. Some leaders have tried the Oreo cookie approach where they sandwich the negative feedback in between two layers of positive feedback. That approach really doesn’t work either because again, the team member stopped listening after hearing “BUT”.

The Senn Delaney team suggested using the word “AND” instead of “BUT”. The substitution of that small word sets the conversation up for success because the person is likely to listen to the words that follow. When you share with someone that you believe that they could be EVEN MORE EFFECTIVE if they…, you establish a positive tone to the discussion. This approach is much more positive because you are acknowledging that they are already successful and what follows is your opinion as to actions they can take to become even more effective. 

As William James shared, people want positive affirmation and I believe that most team members genuinely want to know how to do their jobs better. The Senn Delaney approach provides the framework for helping them understand how to leverage the things they do well while building upon those attributes with additional feedback in an effort to become the most effective team member possible.

Turn your frown upside down as you prepare to deliver your performance evaluations by using the Senn Delaney method. If you use this simple but powerful approach, I am willing to bet your team members will walk out of the meeting with smiles instead of frowns as well!

Best wishes as you execute one of your most critical leadership duties! Stay safe and healthy.