So the division went on a feedback campaign. They spent more than $1 million with a consulting firm to develop rigorous, customized competency models. They trained managers to evaluate employee performance (based on dozens of relevant competencies), and give employees feedback about their developmental gaps and opportunities.

None of it helped. Two years later, 50% of managers were still not completing performance reviews, the reviews that were done had little impact on performance, and turnover remained undesirably high. Which was all entirely predictable. Because feedback rarely, if ever, achieves its desired objectives.

What’s the Point of Feedback?

Over the past 30 years, companies have been so focused on creating cultures of feedback, that we’ve forgotten why we’re doing it in the first place.

The objective of feedback is to help people improve performance. We want people to up their game. To live up to their potential. To contribute powerfully to their teams. To interact effectively with colleagues. We want our organizations to become places where people can skillfully and candidly communicate with one another in the service of their growth and improved performance. Those are all worthy goals.

But here’s the key point: Telling people they are missing the mark is not the same as helping them hit the mark.

In fact, it often has the opposite effect. Richard Boyatzis and his team have found that negative feedback (“Here’s what you’re doing wrong”) reduces engagement in 360 feedback conversations and suppresses exploration of future goals and desires.

And calling it “constructive” feedback doesn’t fool anyone. In their 2019 HBR article “The Feedback Fallacy,” Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall marshal overwhelming evidence that focusing on shortcomings and weaknesses doesn’t help the recipient of the feedback get better.

Which makes complete sense when you think about it. Of all forms of communication, feedback is perhaps the hardest to give and receive. The giver has to criticize, which might hurt someone’s feelings — so they avoid having the conversation in the first place. And if the conversation does occur, the recipient is likely to feel shame, hearing some version of “You’re not good enough, and you need to change.”

And people will do just about anything to avoid feeling shame, including denying the problem (no problem = no shame) or blaming it on someone else (not my fault = no shame). Even when someone appears to respond positively and “maturely” to feedback, they’re often inwardly in fight-or-flight mode.

But what about positive feedback, which highlights what they did well? It’s a form of criticism; if I can approve of your behavior here, I can also disapprove of your behavior there. Plus, focusing on positives won’t necessarily address weaknesses that are getting in the way of performance.

So if feedback doesn’t help people up their game, then what does? In our book, You Can Change Other People, we share a four-step process.