Motivation and feedback

Feedback is a process designed to provide information to individuals about how they are doing (or have done) on tasks. In order for feedback to be effective, it should be provided as soon as possible after the occurrence, and should provide specifics on what an individual did well and what he/she could improve. It is important to remember that feedback should always be about the task (e.g., ‘your reports are very succinct, but could use more data on the gap analysis’) and never about the person (e.g., ‘you are a great employee’, or ‘you will never amount to anything’!). Timely and specific feedback, provided in a spirit of helping, is likely to help the individual improve his/her performance, whereas ambiguous feedback or personal comments are likely to make the individual defensive.

Task: For this task, we suggest you work with a couple of classmates (or co-workers). Assign them a task that both are familiar with, or something straightforward like preparing a speech. After they have completed the task, talking to them individually, tell one of them how they might improve what they did on the task, and provide specifics on how they might do better. Next, tell the other individual that he/she did a good job (or bad job), but provide no specifics. Later, talk to them together and ask how they felt when you gave them the feedback, and how they would go about changing what they had done. You should find that the individual who received specific and timely feedback would be able to give specifics on how he/she would improve on the task, whereas the other individual would be at a loss for how to improve or may simply come up with generalities. Next, ask them specifically about how they felt when you gave them the feedback – watch the reactions of the person who was simply told ‘good job’ or ‘bad job’.