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Three Elements of Effective Feedback

Finding the time and courage to give people constructive feedback on their performance can be tricky. We all know that that it’s a vital part of personal development and team performance, so it’s obviously a great thing to do.

But most of us are busy and telling people how they’re doing can be hard.

If you’ve ever had to tell someone they’re not performing you’ll know just how hard it can be. Most people like to be liked: We want to be nice and have others be nice to us. Telling them they’re not measuring up to our expectations might seem less than nice. So we feel uncomfortable about saying anything and avoid it if we can.

If you highlight an issue they may disagree, they might get angry or cry, they may criticise you, or they may not even be aware that there’s a problem.

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5 Voice Tips for Brilliant Personal Impact- How to Sound Convincing and Authentic

Thanks in part to Meryl Streep it’s a pretty open secret now that Margaret Thatcher had voice lessons to lower the pitch of her voice in order to up her gravitas level on the world stage.

Rumour has it David Beckham has done similar as he looks to a future where increasingly he will be required to talk with his mouth rather than his feet. Certainly, it’s noticeable in recent footage that his voice appears to have taken on a more authoritative tone, but of course that could simply be maturity and experience breeding confidence.

These two figures have iconic status and could be forgiven for not bothering too much about their vocal impact. People, in general, will be interested in what they have to say anyway, more likely they’ll be hanging on every word.

However they haven’t gained that iconic status by accident. They both realize the value of taking care of their personal brand and a large part of that is how they sound.

 

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Effective Time Management: Eating that elephant

Time to blow the cobwebs off our New Year’s resolutions yet again, so I thought I’d offer a bit of help for those struggling with an important task that keeps getting shunted to the bottom of the pile because it seems impossible to achieve.

How do you eat an elephant?

One bite at a time.

That’s all very well but it’s still a big elephant and it can be difficult working out where to take the first bite.

If the logical first step in a big task is still so daunting that you’re endlessly procrastinating, then how about being illogical?

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