Basic Guidelines for Giving Feedback
McGill and Beatty (in "Action learning: A practitioner’s guide", London: Kogan Page, 1994, p. 159-163) provide useful suggestions about giving effective feedback:
1. Clarity -- Be clear about what you want to say.
2. Emphasize the positive -- This isn’t being collusive in the person's dilemma.
3. Be specific -- Avoid general comments and clarify pronouns such as “it,” “that,” etc.
4. Focus on behavior rather than the person.
5. Refer to behavior that can be changed.
6. Be descriptive rather than evaluative.
7. Own the feedback -- Use ‘I’ statements.
8. Generalizations -- Notice “all,” “never,” “always,” etc., and ask to get more specificity -- often these words are arbitrary limits on behavior.
9. Be very careful with advice -- People rarely struggle with an issue because of the lack of some specific piece of information; often, the best help is helping the person to come to a better understanding of their issue, how it developed, and how they can identify actions to address the issue more effectively.
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