Asking For Feedback: How To Do It Effectively with Jecara Rivera
Do you want powerful strategies to take your skillset to the next level? Everyone knows that feedback is critical, but why do so many of us struggle with asking for help? This episode reveals a secret technique on how to ask for the guidance needed for success. And more importantly: How can YOU transform this advice into actionable steps and skyrocket your career towards greater heights?
In This Episode, You Will Learn About:
Why asking for feedback is hard
Questions to ask for effective feedback
Actions to take after feedback
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The Resilience and Longevity Mindset
You've had a very unique kind of career in corporate. What do you think has led to your success?
I've been in corporate America for about 20 years, and so I went to school for a degree in Finance and have been working in that same field for some time. And to be able to have a sustaining career like that, you need to have a longevity mindset. You need to be resilient because, for those working up a corporate ladder, the glass ceiling is real. Being looked over is real. And so you have to see the external factors that are around you and be able to navigate through that. But there are also internal factors that you must have so that you can overcome the obstacles that come your way.
For me, I was a teen mom. When I was young, I'm telling you, I was about 13 or 14, I loved money and I'm not even gonna be ashamed to say it. I loved being around money, budgeting it, and costing it. I would take my dollar bills and iron them. I knew I was gonna be in the area of finance at some point in my life. I could see myself in my power suit and my black briefcase with my hair up in the French roles. Back in the day, French roles were on point. You had to have one if you were powerful. And I saw myself as that person, as a first black female CFO of a major corporation.
And I lived my life with that. I was always goal oriented. Around 16 though, I tell you, boys get in your way and distract you. And that I was definitely distracted. I found out I was pregnant at 16 and that was a very hard point in my life. I felt that all the dreams I had dashed were gone. There was no expectation for me to even graduate high school. I was told that one in seven teenage girls graduate high school and that I would probably just end that year. I might go to night school, but there was not much expectation from others around me. At that moment I had to make a decision. What was I going to do? All I could do was cry because I couldn't see myself going beyond high school at that point.
And have you ever been so sad that you would cry? That you would cry yourself into the pillow, that you had to flip the pillow over at night just to get it on so it wasn't so soaking wet? Now, we've all been through pain. I mean, I really believe that my pain, my story may not be your story, but we know what that feels like to be at the bottom of something. But if it wasn't for the belief of my mom, she looked at me and said, "Girl, what do you want? And whatever you want, you can have." I had to believe in her belief in me to be able to stand back up and look at those and dust those dreams off and step back into things.
Now at 16, I wasn't very self-aware. I just knew that I wanted something more and I worked for it. Looking back at that time, I know what it takes to be successful, not just in life, but in business. You need to master your thoughts. You have to have the wherewithal to say to yourself, I can't sit in this funk anymore. I can't keep crying. I have to look at what is possible and then work on that. Second, you have to believe in yourself enough to know that the world is abundant and full. And lastly, you have to ask for help, and we're afraid to do that. Even in the corporate world, I was afraid I didn't wanna seem incapable or incompetent. And being a single mom and a teen mom, I didn't know what I didn't know, so I had to ask for help. In any area of your life and business career, you need to be able to grow and get your MBA.
I graduated high school with honors. Mind you, forget all the people who told me I couldn't. I got my bachelor's degree in finance and went on to get my MBA. In this quick short story, I want you to get your MBA as well. Get to master your thoughts, believe in yourself and ask for help. That's how you become successful in life and business. That is definitely a lesson in resilience. And what I heard you say is how many people had put their own perceptions and restrictions on you with their thoughts on what you can and can't do without maybe even truly knowing you. Just putting you up and saying, I'm gonna put you in the box of statistics versus truly understanding what you want, what you're capable of, and that sounds like your mom.
Your mom was a person that said, what do you want? She didn't put you in that box of what other people could or could not do, and you had a choice. I believe that we have these moments in life where we hit this crossroad, and we can either look at it and say, "Well, I got pregnant at 16 and I'm not gonna graduate high school. This is just the life that I'm gonna live." Or you say, "No, this is a part of my journey, and it's gonna be difficult. There's definitely gonna be some elements of it that are gonna be more challenging than some of the other 16-year-olds that are out there, but I'm still gonna achieve what I wanna achieve." I imagine the role model you are for your kids.
That makes a big difference because a lot of times we do things because we feel it's the right thing to do, but people are always watching. People are watching and I tell my kids, I wanna be authentically me at all times. Your mom is not perfect. Okay. I am definitely doing the best that I can. So when you see me fall, because I don't ever want them to think that I'm on this pedestal, my mom can't relate because she's never been there. No, you're gonna see me fall, but you're also gonna see me get back up. That's where that resilience, you can't just teach that with words. For your kids and for your teammates and for your friends, we are that for each other. And I think that that's super important. I love how you said that you're a role model. Your people are looking, people are watching.
I believe sometimes those moments where we share the failures that we've had and the lessons that we learn build a deeper connection with the people around us.
What Does Feedback Mean?
You talked about feedback and there is definitely a fear around feedback and taking the courage and the risk of asking for feedback. But before we go into it, how do you define feedback?
That's a great point, and that whole section is asking for help, asking for clarity, and asking for feedback. It's fear around feedback that really comes from we're afraid of what people are gonna tell us. We're afraid of the negative comments that we're here and instead of asking, we just assume the worst, and we're our own worst critic and we never ask.
The definition of feedback that I use is, it's just information to make improvements. That's it. Is it positive? Is it negative? Is it good? Is it bad? It's information. When you ask for feedback, look at it as information and do what my grandma says, you eat the meat and spit out the bone. You take what's needed, take what you can use, and if the rest throw it away. If someone's giving you feedback that's not even qualified to give you feedback, you can throw all that in the trash. But feedback is just information to make improvements.
Feedback from people that you know are going, to be honest, that you trust that is gonna give you the feedback, that has had some of the successes that you maybe wanna get to. Sometimes there are people out there that will give you feedback, but they've never been in that position and they're just going based on their own perceptions and observations or judgments as well. It's also looking at when you do ask for feedback, there's the type of people that you're asking for agreed feedback as well.
How Do We Ask for Feedback?
You've defined feedback, you've kind of identified the people that you trust. They are gonna be honest and transparent and have your best interest at heart. As you said, you eat the meat and throw away the bones. It's a great analogy. But now let's talk about how do you ask for feedback.
There are two things I wanna mention here, number one, you have to ask for it early and often. When we're in a corporate space, we have that yearly, annual review performance and pay review you might have, and that's right about the time most people are having an end of the year, the beginning of the next year. You're talking about what happened for the past year. You've waited too long and I tell my direct reports that, you know what? If I say anything in this performance review that I haven't already told you, then I'm doing my job wrong. Because as a leader and our families and in our businesses, we should be giving feedback often as well.
So number one, ask for it early and often. I have a question, do you find that when you ask for feedback, you get a direct answer that you can actually apply in action? Or is it more like, oh, you're doing great, things are fine?
That's a great question. I think it depends on the question that I ask, because if I just say, "How am I doing?" Then it's like, "Oh, you're doing great." Instead, it's being clear, concise, and detailed on the specific areas that I want the feedback on, but also saying, what are my blind spots? Because sometimes I don't even know what areas would really benefit me from the feedback. As much as I wanna ask clear, concise questions, I also wanna ask potentially, what are my blind spots that I may not be aware of, and how would that serve me in developing those skill sets.
That's wonderful. I love how you said that because what I find is that most women, and this is their studies and I can provide that study, it shows that most in a corporate space that men get more specific action than women do. And it's kind of bias, not bias, but things that we don't notice we're doing unconsciously. So for women, it's, "Oh, you're doing good." Even if you asked for a specific, how did I do on this project, you tend to get a softer answer, which you can't really take action on. Men may receive a response that says, "You did great on that presentation. Do more of that." Then you do more of that.
If you're not getting specific action, it doesn't really help you in the long run. I like to share with folks, this is my secret weapon. When you're asking for feedback, ask early and often, but your secret weapon is to ask quantitatively. The question you'll say is, "Can you, on a scale from one to 10 rate my performance," over the last week, month, quarter, or rate my product or the quality of our relationship, whatever it is you're asking for over a certain period of time. That way they have to give you a number. If they say, "Oh, everything's great, you're a 10." Your follow-up question becomes, "Why so high?" Because it's great that I'm a 10, but now you're gonna tell me why it's high so that I can continue that same action behavior.
If you tell me it's a three, okay, why so low? And you're gonna sit back and listen. There might be something that they share with you that you didn't realize was an expectation of you. And I like, "Oh, I didn't know you needed me to do that." Now that I know that, again, information, is not bad feedback, it's just information. Now I know to do that, I can do that better. And then your follow on question from that is, how do I make it to a, not a 10, that's probably a too big bridge to follow, maybe how do I make it to a five? So they can give you that specific action that you can take so you can build the quality of the performance, the product, the relationship, whatever it is you're asking.
Now I tell you, my husband already knows, I ask this question often. He's gotten to the point where he just tells me I'm a three. I think it's gonna hurt my feelings, but I'm strong, I'm resilient. I don't need that negativity, Sir. But I do listen, so I've asked this question to my bosses at work, my family, and my friends because I really believe that I want to be better, so tell me and give me specifics so that I can be better. I'm asking the right people the right question to get the right response.
The Feed Forward Coaching
That is great advice and the secret to asking for effective feedback. I called that Feed Forward Coaching. Because if feedback, I think of, well, the information I'm taking in and kind of taking it back. But what questions you are asking is quantitative information. How can I measure my success and what steps can I take to get to that next level? So it's that feed-forward coaching.
And then I also think of if an employer or the person that is giving you the feed-forward coaching does give you that higher rating than a follow-up question could look like if you see this as a strength of mine, do you see this as an opportunity to maybe mentor somebody? To be involved in maybe some special projects? How can I use a strength to better the organization, my peers, and the people around me and be in that
leadership role?
I totally agree. And that's the one thing you mentioned before, sometimes you just don't know what you don't know. You don't know what your blind spots are. If we can pinpoint something that's working, how do we make a bigger impact? And those folks in your life can help make sure that you can amplify that in other areas.
Another thing you mentioned too is when you have those blind spots, sometimes even asking that question, because some people, see what you're doing and they see you're doing well. What they may not know, you're either working on something or that you do want feedback on areas that you haven't specifically asked for. So there are times when I, when I'm ready, when I'm really ready, and I ask for the feedback of, well, what am I not asking? What can I be doing better at that I haven't asked you about yet? And in that way, sometimes I get people thinking, okay, well she really wants to be better and I did notice this, or this is how we can amplify that.
That way it takes that information and the opportunities that are there to grow and takes strengths and amplifies those as well, so you get both sides. What am I missing by blind size? What am I not asking? And then what are things going well that we could
amplify?
How Leaders Should Maximize Feedback
A lot of times we're always asking for feedback for ourselves. What advice would we give to those who are in a leadership role? Because one thing that I heard you say, and I see this often within an organization, is the one time a year that we give feedback is during the annual performance review. A lot can happen in a year and part of mentoring and supporting and leading others is continuous coaching throughout the year. So, as you've said, anything that's outlined in the annual performance review is never a surprise. It's conversations that I've taken throughout the year. So what advice would you give to leaders?
Great question. The advice I would give is to give feedback immediately and continuously. That's one of my favorite words: continuous feedback. Always giving is just like a cycle, and when I meet immediately, I mean immediately after the meeting is done. If your employee has done well, the presentation went well say. If there is an issue going on in the group, don't wait for things to fester. Bring that to the attention and awareness, and if there needs to be some training on business acumen or how to write an email effectively, or whatever the case might be, do it right away. Waiting until your monthly tag up or your yearly review to say, "These are the things you could have done better," I believe that as leaders, we're responsible to help build our teams, and the way to do that is to let them know immediately what they've done well and where they can improve.
And I don't make it a big point, don't always lean on one or the other. We could be, I think it's called, you have that halo bias that, okay, you're perfect and you have no wrong, now you're not helping them grow in the other areas where they could. And if you're always focusing on the negative, then folks will tend to look at you and say, they're never going to feel or you're never gonna feel appreciated if you're always focused on the negative. Be sure you're balanced in your feedback, but it should be continuous and it should not be a one-time conversation.
I wanna add to that too is when you do provide the feedback, provide them with the resources. If you're saying it would be to get to that next level or to become an expert in this particular skillset or to develop this particular X, Y, Z skillset that looks like taking these particular steps also let me provide you some resources so that you can develop.
Maybe it's online courses, maybe it's aligning yourself with a mentor, getting involved in a special project, but we always get to do that next step in providing them with the tool so that they can be successful in developing that skill set. Agreed, a hundred percent.
Practicing the Coaching Mindset
There's so much advice that you gave on what is feedback. What are the effective ways to ask for feedback, and what leaders can do in providing feedback? Anything else that you wanna leave out to people with?
I would leave leaders with that question. And I would challenge you to use the question in business and in life, but l love twisting it too, as a leader and you're someone that gives feedback. Be ready to answer those questions on one to 10 and don't be afraid to use it. I know as a leader sometimes you hate to say, "Oh, you were a three today." Well, if they were a three, have your feedback and your resources to help build.
If we really take this leadership role responsibly, we don't take it lightly, we're gonna take it full on. I'm a leader here in this role at home. No matter where we are, we really need to be in the coaching mindset. I believe that as leaders, and coaches, we make the best possible people around us because we're gonna empower them to become better people. And the only way to empower is to be truthful, honest, and direct and give specific feedback and tools to help them be better. So I leave you with, number one, make sure that you get your own MBA, and master your thoughts. Believe in yourself, ask for help and ask for feedback, and to do it in a way that's gonna improve yourself and improve others.
I'm also thinking too, when you mentioned something about leaders and asking that one to 10 questions, it's also an opportunity for a leader to ask for feedback from their team. It is not a one-sided conversation. It is very much about that person asking for feedback, but it's also our opportunity to say, "Hey, on a scale of one to 10, how do you feel like I'm supporting you?"
I do that with my teams now, and you'll be amazed by the answers. Some people don't wanna give a number. They're like, "You're doing great." I'm like, "No, tell me. Seriously, I wanna know. I wanna be better." And you'll find time, it takes time to build trust because a lot of folks don't wanna tell my manager anything wrong or bad. One thing I will share is what I tend to do to give them something I'm working on. If I get someone who just can't give me anything other than a 10, I'm like, you're just saying that. I'll say, "You know what I'm working on during meetings not to talk over other people." When someone else is talking, I wanna step back and I have an issue with that. Can you be my guide on that so when I ask you next week, can you tell me how I did? And that way they feel like we are a part of the journey. They see I'm trying to grow as a leader. and now they know that they can help me out as well, in that we are now partners. Just again, being vulnerable, asking them the question, and then helping them along the way and letting them know, "Hey, I'm not perfect and this is what I'm working on. I love your support in that too."
You're giving them permission to speak up. That's what it is. You're giving them permission to speak up and that creates a trusting safe space where they, they know they're not gonna get in in trouble because you're the one that says, I want the feedback, give this to me.
