Managers · Primly Community

how to give critical feedback to a direct report without destroying the relationship

firsttime_mgr · 5 replies

One year in as a manager and the thing nobody prepared me for is feedback conversations. Not the positive ones. The hard ones where you have to tell someone their work isn't good enough, or that their communication style is causing friction with the team.

I messed up my first few of these badly. I either softened it so much the person left thinking everything was fine, or I was direct and they got defensive and our relationship took months to recover.

Here's what's actually been working for me after a lot of trial and error:

Separate the observation from the judgment. Say what you saw, not what you concluded. "I noticed you didn't share the draft with the team before the presentation" lands differently than "you don't communicate enough."

Give it close to when it happened. Holding feedback for the next 1:1 in three weeks means you're both operating on different timelines. I try to find 15 minutes within a day or two.

Ask before advising. I started asking "what do you think got in the way?" before I offered any suggestions. Half the time they already know. More than half.

Don't cushion the landing with compliments. The feedback sandwich thing. I genuinely think it trains people to stop listening to praise because they're waiting for the "but." I just say the thing, then ask what they think.

The relationship damage usually comes from inconsistency or surprise, not the feedback itself. If someone's hearing hard feedback for the first time after 6 months of glowing check-ins, that's a manager problem.

Anyone else with first-year lessons here? Genuinely learning this as I go and some months feel like I'm just winging it.

5 replies

careerveteran

The feedback sandwich critique is real. Took me years to unlearn it. Another thing that helped: I started asking myself "have I created the conditions for this person to succeed?" before every hard conversation. Sometimes the honest answer is no, and that reframes the whole thing.

firsttime_mgr

This is the one I keep coming back to. Had a situation last month where I was about to give someone feedback on output quality and when I asked myself that question I realized I hadn't actually made the requirements clear. Completely changed the conversation.

director_dee

The timing thing is critical. I tell new managers: if you're feeling nervous about a feedback conversation, that's a signal to have it sooner, not later. The longer you wait, the more loaded it gets.

growth_gabe

What about situations where you've given the same feedback multiple times and nothing changes? That's where I always get stuck.

careerveteran

When feedback isn't landing after 2-3 clear conversations, it usually means one of: they don't believe it's a real problem, they don't know how to change it, or they don't want to change it. Each requires a different response. Figuring out which one is the actual work.