Prior to the Feedback Training and using the Feedback Profiler®, “participants never thought of feedback as a way to keep on learning and helping their colleagues to learn and develop so that the overall quality of the team is on a good track. They thought of it as an often times uncomfortable, personal favor, rather than a professional duty.” – Bastian Küntzel, intercultures Consultant
Giving feedback at Google
At Google, customer advertisements pay the bills[i]. With tens of millions of (U.S.) dollars in revenue earned by Google globally from advertisements, Google Poland is doing it’s part in the company’s global market by placing stock in the quality of their teams that provide customer service to advertisers worldwide. The company, their teams and their customers profit. This article outlines the experience of one Google Poland team that invested in enhancing the practice of feedback in order to achieve increased team quality. “For them,” said training consultant Bastian Küntzel, who developed and delivered the feedback training for the team using the Feedback Profiler®, “it was as much a team building activity as it was investing in the good communication within the team in the future.” The workshop was presented by Incontro, a consultancy owned by Bastian; Feedback Profiler® product designers Marcus Hildebrandt and Stefan Meister provided pre-workshop consultation on how to best apply the tool to the specific customer context. It should be noted that Google works with many different suppliers and does not have exclusive partnerships on feedback-related professional development with Incontro or intercultures.
A Brief Introduction to the Team
The subject Google Poland team is made up of hand-picked high performers who are accustomed to excelling. Having been identified as “high potentials”[ii] in their previous contexts, team members are often not used to receiving less-than-complimentary feedback. However, in a team of high performers, members can necessarily learn from their peers. Plus, for most, their current role at Google Poland is their first professional job, and many have not previously worked abroad or in an office environment. In the last year, the team experienced a turnover rate of 80 percent. In pre-training interviews, members reported both that they had a great feedback culture and a poor feedback culture in the team.
The Feedback Profiler®: A Data-Driven Tool
The Feedback Profiler® is a tool—offered both online and in a pencil-and-paper version—that assesses preferences in giving and receiving feedback in professional environments. It’s used by tandems, small or large group constellations or organizations to help create a feedback culture that feels resonant to its members. Bastian chose the tool for his second feedback-related intervention with the team because he understands that Google is a very data-driven company and appreciates discussing changes not merely based on huches, but backed by tangible insights. Additionally, the Feedback Profiler offers an accessible framework to guide discussions about feedback practice.
The four Dimension of the Feedback-Profiler
The tool works by collecting data from respondents across 4 research-derived dimensions:
- Drivers, or what motivates us to give feedback;
- Setting, or in what circumstances is feedback given;
- Process, or how feedback is given and received;
- Focus, or on what content feedback is given.
All Results at a Glance
Respondents’ data sets are consolidated into a report of results that offers a data-driven starting point for specific groups of colleagues to discover areas of convergence and divergence in how they practice or prefer to practice feedback. Through it, companies, their teams and their customers profit through increased performance. For this specific workshop, it was decided that Feedback Profiler questionnaires would be completed and the results analyzed by Bastian prior to the training. If need be, follow-up discussions and individual coaching would be scheduled for the following fiscal quarter. In the workshop itself, Feedback Profiler results were presented to team members to provide structure for discussion and the establishment of consensus-based guidelines around feedback.
For Those at the Top, There’s Room for Growth in Giving Feedback
For Bastian, feedback is “providing someone an insight into another persons‘ subjective experiences” of their behavior. He asks seemingly simple yet complex questions for team leaders and members alike:
- How can you re-frame feedback as a professional and collegial service?
- How is giving feedback different from giving a performance appraisal?
- What’s the difference between an observation, interpretation and evaluation of others’ behavior— and how can we be more aware about the differences?
In order to create ownership of a sustainable feedback practice, these are questions that must be negotiated by teams. For leaders specifically, Bastian adds that leaders who are good at and/or regularly give performance appraisals may easily “overestimate their skill in giving feedback when they are used to evaluating and being in a hierarchical position.” This focus on evaluatory feedback influences the feedback culture of a professional environment. However, we are increasingly experiencing that competently delivered explicit feedback between intercultural teams creates increased understanding and better management of (implicit) culture-based behaviors. Leaders can progressively influence feedback culture through practicing high-quality feedback and investing in their own and their staff’s competences in both giving and receiving feedback.
Be the Spoon!
Bastian Küntzel makes an analogy between giving feedback and a chef with a tasting spoon. A professional chef continuously tastes her cuisine, literally the result of decisions that she has made. Is there too much salt? Not enough acidity? “The role of the feedback giver,” says Bastian, “is to be the spoon…to give insight on the results of decisions they made—conscious or unconscious. It’s for the recipient [chef] to evaluate what they do with these insights.” Just as the quality and consistency of restaurants depends on chefs constantly tasting their food as they cook, the same is particularly true in intercultural office environments. To turn teams into high-performing teams, each member needs to constantly be aware of—and adjust—their communications, collaborations and interactions to achieve the desired result.
Meet Bastian Küntzel
Bastian Küntzel is a consultant with intercultures CEE (Central and Eastern Europe) in Wrocław, a subsidiary of the intercultures Global Head Office based in Berlin, Germany. Bastian is the Principle of Incontro, and specializes in communication and management with a focus on their intercultural dimensions. Request a direct referral to Bastian as a member of the intercultures CEE network.
The Feedback Profiler® is a registered product designed by Marcus Hildebrandt and Stefan Meister, and is powered by intercultures. Clickto learn more online, or email the product team with inquiries.
Read the first part of this two-part article on feedback in our May 2014 article, Feedback as a Challenge.
[i] According to Google’s Investor Relations site, total advertising revenues totaled US$50.5 million in 2013 compared to nearly US$5 million in other revenues. In the first quarter of 2014 (unaudited), total advertising revenues totaled nearly US$14 million compared to nearly US$1.5 million in other revenues. Source: https://investor.google.com/financial/tables.html.
[ii] “High potential” is an abbreviation for “higher performer,” an employee identified for their current demonstration of professional competence and potential capacity to lead.
The above article was included in the June 2014 intercultures e-newsletter.
Photo credit title picture: Getty Images.
Photo credit partial extract from a sample Feedback Profiler® report: Feedback Profiler®.