Here is an excerpt from another outstanding article written by Robert Steven Kaplan and made available by The McKinsey Quarterly at its website. To read the complete article, check out other resources, and sign up for free email alerts, please click here.

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As executives become more senior, they are less likely to receive constructive performance and strategic feedback. They can get it by calling on their junior colleagues.

By the time you become a senior executive, you have no doubt honed a set of skills and talents that enable you to be effective in your job. To help you get to this point, you likely had coaches and mentors who closely monitored your progress, prodded you to develop your talents, and, when necessary, confronted you with criticisms that you may not have wanted to hear but needed to hear in order to continue your upward path.

At this stage in your career, most (if not all) of your colleagues are probably subordinates. While you may be “overseen” by a board of directors or very senior boss, your superiors probably no longer closely observe your daily behavior. Instead, they now form their opinions of you based on your presentations in relatively formal settings or on secondhand reports from your subordinates.

As a result of this, many executives find that as they become more senior, they receive less coaching and become more confused about their performance and developmental needs. They may also become increasingly isolated from constructive criticism—subordinates do not want to offend the boss and may believe that constructive suggestions are unwelcome and unwise. Many senior executives also unwittingly send off a “vibe” that while they claim to encourage constructive criticism, they really don’t want to hear it. At this stage of their careers, they may not have focused sufficiently on developing mutually trusting subordinate relationships that would make getting feedback and advice a lot easier.

Too frequently, when these executives ultimately do receive feedback in their year-end reviews (often as part of a 360-degree-feedback program), they are surprised to be confronted with specific criticisms of their leadership style, communication approach, and interpersonal skills. Worse, they may also hear broad concerns raised about their strategy, key tactical decisions, and operating priorities for the business. These leaders may even learn, often too late, that the various criticisms and concerns have been widely discussed among their subordinates for an extended period of time without them being aware.

I have certainly experienced and observed this phenomenon over the past 25 years in my own executive career and also in working with numerous executives since coming to Harvard Business School. I have seen the tendency for senior executives to become more isolated from constructive criticism and strategic advice—sometimes without their full awareness. As a result, over the past several years, I have worked intensively with my own direct reports and advised many other senior executives to develop specific approaches for getting the essential feedback they need.

The purpose of this article is to distill these approaches into specific and actionable advice. In doing so, I hope to make you more aware of the tendency to become isolated and suggest approaches to getting better feedback, particularly from subordinates, that will help you to materially improve your performance. I will also discuss further steps you can take to get dramatically better strategic advice regarding your business or nonprofit organization. By taking these actions, you should be able to take greater ownership of the feedback process and improve your ability to build your organization, capabilities, and career.

[During the remainder of the article, beginning with a detailed explanation of how to cultivate a network of junior coaches, Kaplan shares a wealth of insights and recommendations that will be of substantial value to all executives, at all kevels and in all areas of operation. To read the complete article, please click here.

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Robert Steven Kaplan is a professor of management practice at Harvard Business School and cochairman of Draper Richards Kaplan, a global venture philanthropy firm. He was previously vice chairman of Goldman Sachs. Elements of this article were adapted from his new book, What to Ask the Person in the Mirror: Critical Questions for Becoming a More Effective Leader and Reaching Your Potential (Harvard Business Review Press, August 2011).