Why Is Negative Feedback So Hard? - Part 2

Summary

Podcast Summary: Manager Tools - "Why Is Negative Feedback So Hard? (Part 2)"

Episode Air Date: February 24, 2025
Hosts: Sarah and Mark

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Overview

This episode of Manager Tools delves into the practical and psychological reasons why delivering negative feedback as a manager is so challenging. Expanding on Part 1, Sarah and Mark break down the core barriers to effective feedback delivery and outline the steps managers must take to create a culture where negative feedback can be received positively. The episode is rich with real-world anecdotes, practical advice, and Manager Tools’ signature data-driven approach, aiming to equip managers with actionable skills instead of fleeting management theories.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Previous Failures and Lack of Support (00:35–04:45)

- Managers’ Past Experiences:

• Many managers have given negative feedback before and "what they received in return... was a whole bunch of pushback and defensiveness." (A, 00:40)
• In extreme cases, negative feedback attempts have led to HR intervention, often leaving managers feeling unsupported.

- Organizational Systems Make It Hard:

• There’s a systemic lack of training for managers, especially when compared to technical roles.
• Promotion to management often happens without teaching critical people-skills or the “Manager Tools Trinity.”

- Mark’s Insightful Analogy:

• "If they can't do those things, they don't get to be a software developer… But for managers, we don’t teach them any of those things that are fairly standard." (B, 02:24)

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2. The Absence of Positive Feedback (05:29–11:28)

- Industry Misconceptions:

• Most articles and “thought leaders” discuss feedback as equaling only negative feedback.
• Mark criticizes this as "a cancer on the profession of management" and "very close to malfeasance." (B, 05:47)

- Ethical Imperative:

• Being a manager is "an ethical burden. You should feel that responsibility when you become a manager." (B, 05:41)

- The Feedback Loop:

• When managers only deliver negative feedback, they ignore the majority of direct reports’ behaviors, resulting in eroded trust.
• “If you define feedback as only negative, you’ll be ignoring the vast majority of behaviors of your directs. That doesn’t make sense… and it erodes trust.” (B, 12:37)

- Quote on Search for Behavior:

• “If you go out looking for negatives, you will find them. And if you go out looking for positives, you will find them.” (B, 13:59)

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3. The Crucial Role of Trust and Sequence (10:06–19:43)

- Building Trust Takes Time:

• Trust is established through regular one-on-ones and regular positive feedback, not merely by removing the negatives.

- The Path to Negative Feedback:

• "The road to negative feedback can only go through positive feedback." (B, 11:01)
• Attempts to shortcut this process lead to resistance and defensiveness.

- Not Just Trust for Withdrawals:

• "We do not build trust... just so we can make at regular intervals withdrawals from this trust account, if you will, using negative feedback.” (A, 16:43)

- Proper Rollout Order:

• One-on-ones → Positive Feedback → Negative Feedback.

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4. Direct Reports’ Previous Boss Effect (20:16–23:00)

- Luggage from Past Bosses:

• Employees come into new roles with experiences from prior managers—often negative—and expect more of the same.
• "They come in with this crust around them, this spiky armor of defensiveness." (B, 20:44)

- Reasonable Wary Reactions:

• Most directs expect feedback to be negative and act accordingly—a low-trust “gotcha” game.
• "Why wouldn’t our directs be wary of feedback? Because they think it’s negative only. Right. They should be." (B, 22:34)

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5. The Importance of Briefing Before Change (23:00–29:39)

- Briefing = Setting Expectations:

• Managers must explain any new process or feedback model before starting it.
• “Never introduce a change to how you manage people without first taking the time to introduce that change before you actually make it.” (A, 26:06)

- Consequences of Skipping Briefing:

• Without clear communication, directs invent their own (often negative) reasons, defaulting to assumptions from past experiences.
• "If you slide it in there to see how it works and they don't know how to respond, they'll respond defensively because of your role power." (B, 27:22)

- Overcoming the "Flavor of the Month":

• Consistent communication and courage to commit to new tools prevents being discounted as just another fleeting management fad.

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6. The Challenge and Necessity of Practice (29:48–33:41)

- Everyone Starts Out Bad:

• It’s normal (and expected) to be awkward or ineffective at first.
• "That wide ability to do virtually anything comes with a cost. That cost is you really suck at everything when you first start doing it." (A, 30:14)

- Fear of Mistakes:

• Managers often fear looking incompetent in front of directs, but not trying is a greater weakness.
• “Doing things differently in the pursuit of excellence and doing them poorly initially is not making a mistake. The true sign of weakness... is not trying.” (A, 32:06)

- Structured Practice:

• Manager Tools recommends 12 weeks of trust-building one-on-ones, followed by eight weeks of only positive feedback before attempting negative feedback.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Mark (00:40): “The vast majority of bosses have tried to give feedback and what they received in return… was a whole bunch of pushback and defensiveness.”
• Mark (05:41): “Management is an ethical thing. You're responsible for taking care of the professional lives of other human beings. That's an ethical burden.”
• Sarah (16:43): “We do not build trust through one on ones, just simply so that we can make at regular intervals withdrawals from this trust account, if you will, using negative feedback... We build up the trust with full intentions that we will continue to add to the trust and keep it at a high level.”
• Mark (20:44): "They come in with this crust around them, this spiky armor of defensiveness."
• Sarah (26:06): "Never introduce a change to how you manage people without first taking the time to introduce the change before you actually make it."
• Mark (32:06): “Doing things differently in the pursuit of excellence and doing them poorly initially is not making a mistake… The true sign of weakness is not trying.”

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Important Segment Timestamps

• 00:35 – Why previous failures make negative feedback so hard
• 05:29 – The critical lack of positive feedback in most organizations
• 11:28 – The role of trust in effective feedback
• 16:43 – The myth of the “trust account withdrawal”
• 20:16 – How directs’ experience with past bosses affects current relationships
• 23:00 – The necessity of briefing before making management changes
• 29:48 – Why practice and perseverance matter most

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Takeaways & Summary

• Delivering negative feedback is tough primarily because of:

  • Past failures and systemic lack of training/support for managers
  • A widespread focus on negative rather than positive feedback
  • The critical need to build trust and rapport before giving negative feedback
  • Employees’ defensive mindsets shaped by previous negative management experiences
  • Managers failing to communicate new approaches before rolling them out
  • The discomfort of being new and bad at a skill, which only practice can overcome

• Action Steps:

  • Start with 1-on-1s to build trust (12 weeks recommended)
  • Introduce positive feedback first (for 8 weeks)
  • Only then, carefully, introduce negative feedback, after briefing your team
  • Normalize the learning curve and don’t fear initial awkwardness

This episode reinforces Manager Tools' foundational philosophy: effective feedback—especially negative—only happens in an environment of trust, clear communication, and practiced skill. There’s no shortcut around the hard work of relationship-building, but, as Mark puts it, “it’s the right thing to do.” (B, 35:14)

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Transcript

[A]

Welcome to Manager Tools.

[B]

This is Sarah and this is Mark.

[A]

Today's cast, why Negative Feedback is so hard? Part 2 of 2.

[B]

The questions this cast answers are, why is negative feedback so darn hard to deliver? What can I do to make negative feedback easier? Why do my directs always argue or defend themselves when I give them negative feedback? If you want the answers to these questions and more, stick around.

[A]

Before we get to the good stuff, just letting y' all know, I will be in Washington D.C. march 18th, 19th and 20th with our effective Hiring, Effective Manager, and Effective Communicator conferences. Register today to join me [e-mail] Register now onto the show. So the next piece then is Previous Failures, folks. The vast majority of bosses have tried to give feedback and what they received in return from their directs was a whole bunch of pushback and defensiveness. And in the worst cases, they got written up and HR was involved, telling them that they can't do that. Again, irrespective of the fact that HR is the part of the organization that probably should have been involved in developing them with training and giving them the tools that they needed to be more successful. Irrespective of the fact that HR ought to be siding with the manager and not the direct.

[B]

Can I just interrupt? That blows people's minds, what you just said. Blows people minds that they think. Oh, no, HR is where I go to complain. Yeah, no, HR is not the union. The. The quasi. The unofficial union of the employees. HR acts that way frequently. And don't get me wrong, folks, we love hr. We love good hr, but we don't like bad hr and HR that says, oh, when an employee complains, I should. Well, we just did a very popular series of podcasts on Manager Tools about grievances last year. This is 2025, but it happened in 2024. We had several. I think we had four or five episode cast about how to. How to handle a grievance. And employees go to HR and HR turns it into grievance, and suddenly the manager's in trouble, managers in trouble for doing what other managers did to her.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And again, what training was there? None. So all of this just leads to the overall feeling that there are a lot of reasons why negative feedback is hard. There are all kinds of systems and processes and behaviors and examples that exist to make it hard for managers. It doesn't have to be, but we respect the fact that if you've been, if you tried it, whether you used our model or not, and it was hard, it's okay. All right. It was made hard and it's not your fault, okay? It's not. The systems and processes aren't where they need to be to take care of managers, to make them feel like I know what my job is now. I tell the story all the time, Sarah, of if you're hiring a software developer, one of the interviews that every software developer goes through is they go through a technical interview and they have to prove that they can write code. They may be given some pseudocode to work on so they don't have to learn the language that the company uses. They, they're given a regression analys to have to do because that's an important part of, of code or they're given something to debug in a language that's relatively well known. And by the way, if they can't do those things, they don't get to be a software developer. They don't get hired. And yet when it comes to promoting people into management, we don't teach them any of those things that are fairly standard. Now, I would argue a great many companies, and this is probably heretical to say a great many companies don't know. They literally don't know what good management is. There have not been exposed to data that we've been exposed to and helped develop. They've not been exposed to the basic manager tools. Trinity. In fact, I had somebody tell me once recently, oh, I'm totally on board with one on ones. My people and I, each of my people, all six of my directs, I can fit them in once a quarter.

[A]

Oh yeah, it's all on board. I hear that.

[B]

And so now there are hundreds, thousands of people around that person who think that one on ones are quarterly.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then they wonder why they're not getting good results.

[A]

Yeah, exactly, exactly. So folks, even if you're a smart manager, you learn a bad lesson. Given all of these external factors, feedback doesn't work. And maybe this is a bad lesson to learn, but it is the lesson most new managers learn and it's reasonable.

[B]

For them to learn it.

[A]

Yeah, exactly, exactly. That's exactly it. But again, they learn that lesson without understanding the critical value of the trust building up front. So even when they do, let's say, roll out the feedback model, they're hesitant, they're uncertain, they're tentative about their efforts. And many directs can sense this tentative unsureness and still push back. And many managers have done what they should have done. Still, the scar tissue from their first failed efforts exist and they hesitate. They talk themselves out of feedback, both positive and negative and nothing changes.

[B]

Exactly. Good. Next one. We've alluded to this 50 times already, lack of positive feedback. If you read a hundred articles, I said this already about feedback, you'll notice something insidious and, frankly, in my opinion, vulgar, because I think of management as an ethical thing. You're responsible for taking care of the professional lives of other human beings. That's an ethical burden. You should feel that responsibility when you become a manager. So when the places you might go on the web to find out information about how to be a manager tell you things that are fundamentally wrong, not just flawed, not just mistaken or well intended, but fundamentally wrong, it's a terrible thing. It's a cancer on the profession of management. When thought leaders talk about feedback, what they really mean is negative feedback. This is really very close to malfeasance. And they don't know. It's just like those digital tools, directors. And I'm sure I'm going to get email from people, I love my digital tool and I'll say, okay, sure, that's good. It's a bit like saying, I'm going to drive faster in the wrong direction. Yeah, you won't get to where you're going any sooner. Frankly, when it comes to direction, most managers don't know what the direction of feedback is. So almost anything will work.

[A]

They'll be incredibly high searchability, though.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. That's great. Your SEO numbers. Yeah. The thought leaders intellectually understand that both positive and negative exist.

[A]

Mm.

[B]

But they still say feedback when what they should say is negative feedback. Well, if you're a young person, if you're just starting out in your career, and every time somebody talks about feedback, they talk about negative feedback, it should be no surprise to you that there's not a lot of positive.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

In the world. So, again, if you've thought this before and you didn't know it, it's okay. It's not your fault. The systems and processes that you went to to try to become educated about your job failed you. It's not your fault.

[A]

Exactly. Yeah. That's the thing, folks. What the popular guidance is saying is wrong. It's just plain wrong. We know that you struggle with it and we understand it, but it's wrong to turn feedback into only a negative.

[B]

Yeah. They say, well, we know you struggle with negative feedback, so we're gonna give you a way to get that. But in doing that again, if you only do that, it's just wrong. It doesn't work right. And by the way, people try it and it doesn't work. And yet there are still new people out there talking about this and focusing only on them.

[A]

And it's, yeah, well, they should know better.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

The thing about it is the people that are saying these things are smart enough to know better. But you know what doesn't get you headlines? Remembering that there's both negative and positive feedback. And if you're more interested in making headlines and getting published rather than explaining what's really happening and giving managers a professional foundation to support them in what they're doing, then talking about it negative is great. There's tons of revenue in talking about it that way.

[B]

For years, Mike and I, when it was just Mike and I, 20 years ago. This is the 20. This 2025 is the 20th anniversary of Manager Tools. And when we first started, I of course had run a consulting firm, coaching and training and consulting firm on management, which is where the data comes from for manager tools. And the web wasn't really a big thing. Mike and I started the company in 2005. Of course the web had existed, but SEO didn't really exist in significant ways. There weren't thousands of companies selling SEO optimization, or I guess I shouldn't say that because it's search engine optimization. So when Mike would say, you know, it would be good if you could write some more clickbaity headlines, I had gotten so disenamored. I had gotten so frustrated with these other thought leaders really screwing up in the way they talk to managers that I didn't want to be clickbaity. I regret it now. I should have done it anyway. We tried. It should have been paying more attention to SEO for years. And I know that Sarah, you and Kate are working to correct that mistake that we made, but I just wanted to stay really far away from it because I didn't want to be the rest of these guys who were saying things that people wanted to hear but not informed about what would work and what would Exactly. That really bugged me.

[A]

Exactly. That's the thing. I think of this the kind of the same way I think about one on ones. What are your purpose? If your purpose is to build an effective relationship, then there are certain other behaviors that are required in order to achieve that thing. If your purpose is to help managers, then there's a certain series of behaviors that will happen with that thing. And most of the people that are talking about management are teaching you to do things like the sandwich technique. Their purpose is not to help you. It is not to help you. We at Manager Tools are here to help You. They're really just not. They're just.

[B]

I can't believe I wrote this entire podcast and we're talking about negative feedback and I never once mentioned the sandwich technique either. That's good or bad, I'm not sure which. Yeah. These hucksters out there, they're not trying to help managers. They're after revenue, they're after increasing their name recognition. Their trying to sell a book. And frankly, when I'm in a bad mood, it ticks me off. It really does. It makes me sick to my stomach. So let's be clear. If you're a manager right now and we're glad to have you here, the road to negative feedback can only go through positive feedback. Now, we've tried to say that a number of ways, but let's be more clear. Why is that? The fact that we have to explain this infuriates us because of all the bad guidance. The reason you have to give positive feedback first is because of trust.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

The vast majority of things that happen in your organization are good.

[A]

Yes, they are.

[B]

Most deadlines do get met. Most of your directs do communicate reasonably well. Most directs, all directs are trying. Actually, not most. Darn near all. 99/ percent are trying to do a good job. The only reason I say not all is because I've heard some horror stories. I have first hand accounts. Of course.

[A]

They're minorities though.

[B]

Tiny, tiny, tiny. Yeah. If the vast majority of behaviors in your organization weren't effective, your organization would cease to exist very quickly.

[A]

Yeah. You would cease to exist in your organization.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I use sports analogies all the time. And I always ask managers, I'm like, how do I know most of the things being done by your team are good? They're like, well, I don't really. I'm like, okay. Can I ask a different question? If the team has a really, really crappy season, what's the first thing that happens in the off season? Everyone's like, they fire the coach. I'm like, yeah. Oh, I've never heard you say, congratulations, coach. They let you keep your job and they invested in you even further. You didn't get removed. That was the other option.

[B]

Yeah. Wow. Yeah, that's really good. I'm going to use that with groups. Yeah. Look, if you define feedback as only negative, you'll be ignoring the vast majority of behaviors of your directs. That doesn't make sense to your directs and it erodes trust.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And by the way, if you doubt that, apply the middleman test. I don't know if we Call it the Horseman middleman test. I used to call it that. We might call it the manager tools middleman test. Remember, the middleman test basically says you're between your boss and your directs, okay? So whenever you're wondering about why your directs are responding the way they are and you're not that much different than your directs and your boss isn't that much different than you, we're all pretty much the same around here. Diversity is good, but there's the things that make us similar are a lot more common than the things that make us different. Ask yourself how you feel when your boss only points out your mistakes. Does it feel good? I would guess not. So then why would we expect directs to feel good when we give them negative feedback if we haven't taken the road through positive feedback? And if you only give negative, like we said before, you're going to be destroying trust. And if you haven't built up trust with one on ones, you'll quickly get into a trust deficit and you might as well kiss any future efforts. Even if somebody recommends a great new manager tool or a process tool or a system tool or a, or a meeting tool or a digital tool, all of those things will be at risk because your trust deficit is so high or your trust score is so low that they consider the source and they're like, no, this guy doesn't recognize when I do. Well, he may be aware of it. And what's even worse, a guy once told me, I know why I don't get positive feedback because my boss sees me doing it and he doesn't want to tell me. I had never thought of it that way, Sarah. I had always thought, oh, they don't really know. Well, part of the reason they don't really know is they're not looking for it. Right, Right. And that's a huge mind shift for a lot of managers. If you go out looking for negatives, you will find them. And if you go out looking for positives, you will find them. It's called the reticular activating system. The things you're looking for will appear. But if you're not looking for it, if you're not looking for positives, you won't see them. And if you're looking for negatives, you're going to see them. And if you haven't built up trust, you're going to get defensiveness and pushback.

[A]

Exactly. And even worse, if you have built trust through, hopefully manage your tools one on ones, and then all you do is lean into negative feedback. You're going to be burning down every ounce of the goodwill that you've built up. All that hard work that you put into manage your tools, one on ones thrown into the complete trash because you just ruined it.

[B]

Here's another great anecdote. I was talking to a guy once and we finished one on ones. He said, this is great. I get the idea of trust. I've never trusted my bosses. I had never heard it said this simply before and I should have, but I. Maybe I did, but I don't remember it. He said, I get it. You want to build up trust and I want to be able to trust my boss and I also want my directs to trust me. And then he said, and I assumed this is. We're going to talk about feedback next, Mark. Right, Mark. And I said, yeah, feedback is next. Great. You're going to love it. It's really simple. And he said, and we're doing this trust so we can give them negative feedback. So as we take away the trust by giving him negative feedback, we'll have built it up enough that it won't be too bad. I mean, my mouth just hung open. I'm like, oh, oh, no, no. Yeah, really wait, just wait. I promise you. Wait until we go through the feedback section here for a couple of hours and I teach you how to do it and why to do it and what the principles are. Yeah, I was flummoxed. I'm rarely speechless, but I was speechless, like, oh my gosh. And then I thought, how many other people who have been to our trainings, the hundreds of thousands of managers over the years have been. And they thought, oh, we're building up trust so we can give negative feedback.

[A]

Exactly. No, no, that's not the reason, folks. We do not build trust through one on ones, just simply so that we can make at regular intervals withdrawals from this trust account, if you will. Using negative feedback, we build up the trust with full intentions that we will continue to add to the trust and keep it at a high level of trust. It's not just that we result in like a neutral situation again.

[B]

Yeah, we're going to make deposits and then withdrawals. Deposits and withdrawals? Yeah. Look, if you're going to be a fair and honest manager, folks, the only way to get to negative feedback is to not only build up trust through one on ones, but also to show that you're aware of both your directs, wins and losses. Okay? You have to give positive feedback to show that you're an ethical manager, which then gives you the license With a high trust score as well to then give negative feedback. And then what you'll discover is when you've done one on ones and positive feedback, there won't be the defensiveness and pushback. In fact, I tell every group I train once we get through the positive feedback part of rolling out the trinity, I say, when you start giving positive feedback, I promise you, at least half of you in this room before you get to the time where you're starting to give negative. In other words, using our model to deliver negative feedback, you, many of your directs, the top, let's say the top half, your higher performers, your directs will ask you for negative feedback even before it's time. And by the way, you should say no and say no like to wait, let me just get really good at this feedback model here. More and more positive feedback. And some people, the best performers be like the high Ds particularly will say no, no, no, I don't want to hear about how good I'm doing. And you should just go right to negative or I want, I want more negative. Imagine a world where not only were your directs not defensive and didn't push back, but they came to you and said, hey, I'd want more positive feedback. They might as well take up a sign and walk around the office saying, I trust my boss. Right? Imagine that. That would be fantastic.

[A]

Yeah, that's exactly it, folks. If you want negative feedback to be received, accepted by your directs professionally, without drama or defensiveness or pushback, you, you've got to give tons of positive feedback first. And it's inconvenient and you may not like it. But having measured over 975,000 managers and their behaviors, we can tell you firsthand that's how you have to do it. You can, let's be clear, do it any way you want. But there's only one way we've ever been able to find that works in the long run. One on ones, then positive feedback, and then and only then negative feedback.

[B]

Yep, that's it.

[A]

Pardon the interruption here, folks. Just letting you all know that Manage youe Tools offers a Train the Trainer program where we teach your internal learning and development team how to best present and deliver manager tools training. This model allows for you to train at your convenience and in group sizes desired by your organization. Contact Maggie by emailing her at CustomerServiceAnager tools to get more information and detail on this offering. Now back to the show.

[B]

Okay, next is previous boss effect. Oh, yeah, yeah. Every one of your directs brings to their relationship with you all their previous relationships with all their boss. All their previous bosses. I talk to managers sometimes, Sarah, and they say to me, I really don't like new, inexperienced people coming fresh college graduates, Fresc high school graduates, because they just ask the dumbest questions. They just have no idea they have. I say, you know what? I tell some of them when I'm in an argumentative mood? I say, you know what? I actually like them. They're fresh, they're new. We can put the right imprints on them. And actually, the ones that are harder are. The ones have been managed by another crappy manager for five previous years and they come in with this crust around them, this. This spiky armor of defensiveness. They know. They know, oh, you're going to be another one that just gives you negative feedback. And so they start with an even. At least new people start in with zero, maybe slightly negative because you're the boss. But if they've had a boss for five years and that boss hasn't been good, their negative trust score is even. And as we said before, what's a reasonable assumption about those previous bosses? They were horrible.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You're the next person in line. And again, they're right, based on their previous experience to assume you'll be just like their previous bosses. That may be one of the most inarguable things about managing, because one person almost never gets to work for only one boss for his or her entire career. So they bring their bad lessons with them.

[A]

Exactly. Those bad lessons looked like a boss that didn't do one on ones that didn't give positive feedback, that only gave negative feedback, which, let's face it, she called feedback because she thought there wasn't an option. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. When she gave negative feedback, she made it serious.

[B]

Serious.

[A]

Right. Come to my office, close the door. Right, Exactly. It was a conversation about an issue that needed to be resolved. It was this dark and dramatic thing that drained all life force out of every direct who ever received it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And people sought to avoid these conversations because they weren't meant to help. They were meant to make me feel bad.

[B]

Why wouldn't our directs be wary of feedback? Because they think it's negative only. Right. They should be. They're intelligent. They've learned that feedback is a low trust. Gotcha game.

[A]

This isn't their first day.

[B]

Yeah. When a manager, tools manager starts the process, your directs are going to be defensive and we as managers have to fight through that. We'll talk more about that in a little bit with briefings and One on ones and positive feedback.

[A]

That's exactly it. Which takes us actually beautifully mark into the lack of a briefing. Now, folks, one of the things that we recommend that all managers do is brief before they change. We in fact have an entire podcast called brief before you change. And we've said many times, never introduce a change to how you manage people without first taking the time to introduce that change before you actually make it. And this is why in our teaching and coaching of rolling out the manager tools trinity, one on one's feedback, coaching, delegation, every new tool gets an introduction as part of the rollout. That is, you introduce the concept of one on ones before you actually do a one on one. You answer the questions that all the people on your team have about one on ones before they start to receive one on ones. You in turn introduce the feedback model before you start doing the feedback model. You again answer their questions before they're expected to receive you. Introduce the coaching model before you start using it. You take questions. You can see the theme here.

[B]

Yeah. And again, why do we recommend this? Because we tried having managers simply start using the tools even after we spread them apart and said, do one on ones first and then feedback and then coaching and so on. And there was pushback and defensiveness with every new tool because directs didn't know what was happening and didn't know how their manager wanted them to respond. And so they pushed back. They were uncomfortable. You're doing something new. I wasn't read into it. You know, what's my part in this little play we're doing here?

[A]

Exactly, folks, if you don't tell them why you're changing your behavior, you're leaving it to them to make up the reason why you've changed your behavior.

[B]

And it just occurred to me that you said that. It just occurred to me. What reason will they default to what their previous bosses did? They will guess. Why would my previous bosses, the crappy ones, did. Oh, and so they will impart to you nefarious motivations.

[A]

Exactly, exactly. They assume malicious intent. Like, basically because they're like all the other human beings on the planet Earth. They just assume malicious intent. They think they're in trouble. They think, oh my gosh, who screwed up? Why am I being cast with the same brush? I was doing fine, but now it seems like we're all getting punished for it. If they think they're being punished, they're going to react as though they're being punished.

[B]

No surprise.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

Now, our data, when we say we got data that said directs pushback Directs actually commented, and managers said, yeah, I did six feedbacks and three times I got pushback or whatever. The data don't say why they resist. The data never, never do that. But in a way, frankly, we don't care. The data tell us that when managers try to change the way they manage their directs without explaining the what and the why and the how, directs resist lacking understanding of what effective managers do and why they do it.

[A]

Yeah, that's exactly it, folks. I'm going to say it again because I want to make sure we're perfectly clear on this point. Never introduce a change to how you manage people without first taking the time to introduce the change before you actually make it. Go back to the middleman test that Mark was talking about earlier. You're the direct in this case. Put those shoes on for a minute. Wouldn't you want your boss to tell you what new things they're going to do and how they're going to do them and why they're going to do them? Remember that your directs in this case, are learning right alongside you, and this will help both of you learn faster. And the pushback and the defensiveness will be vastly decreased and disappear much more quickly than if you try and slide it in naturally.

[B]

We guarantee it, the pushback and defensiveness will virtually disappear. There's always one who's just ornery, and that's okay.

[A]

They had a bigger crossbownery every day.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. Now, look, many managers don't want to announce. They're afraid that if they do announce what they're doing, they won't be able to stop because a briefing implies a commitment. So to be clear, folks, we respect the fact that you're saying, ooh, I don't want a brief. I just kind of want to slide it in there and see how it works. Okay, but if you slide it in there to see how it works and they don't know how to respond, they'll respond defensively because of your role power, even if your trust score is actually pretty good. So there's risk here. But look, guys, we all know there's no rewards without some risk.

[A]

Exactly. I call that the diet rule, Mark.

[B]

Oh. I mean, I don't know this rule.

[A]

If you go on a diet and you don't tell any of your friends, you can still order French fries when you go for lunch with them. But if you tell all your friends that you're on a diet, and then when you're out for lunch with them, then if you try and order fries, someone's going to call you on it. So you're probably not going to order fries. You're going to get a salad so it's easier to diet if you don't tell anybody.

[B]

I'm reading a book right now called the Success Principles. It's one of those old books that sells millions every year and it's a fabulous book. And it talks about being clear about what you want and planning for it and making it happen. And one of the things he says is if you take a group, several groups of people, and you ask them, this group you tell just write down your goals. You know, the first group is just have goals. Okay. The next group has to write them down, the next group has to display them. The next group has to display them and tell their friends. And it is the big increase and goal in telling is when they tell their friends because they're going to be guardrails for you, helping you to get where you need to be. And look, if you don't brief, you're just like the previous bosses of your directs that cues your directs when you start something new, something unbriefed, that they should push back, hoping that you'll go back to the old way.

[A]

Yeah. And you might. Flavor of the month.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Briefing ups the stakes, but it reduces the chances that you will be a flavor of the month. And flavor of the month is a self licking ice cream cone in a negative way. You try something, they push back because they know they don't want you to continue doing it because they want their world not to change. They don't like people with role power over them changing their environment. They want things generally to stay the same. And so they push back. And so you drop back and then you try again and they push back. And then you hear flavor of the month from the directs when in fact they want flavor of the month, meaning they can make you go away.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

That's the secret nasty message of flavor of the month. And then you're stuck quitting and just being like all the other bad managers.

[A]

Exactly. All right, so that takes us to our last section. Lack of practice. Now, folks, let's face it, to get good at something, you have to practice doing that thing. The beauty of being a human being is we're all capable of doing virtually anything. But that wide ability to do virtually anything comes with a cost. That cost is you really suck at everything when you first start doing it.

[B]

Yes, you're terrible.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. You have to go over what we over here at Manager tools call the McGuire hump of the Horseman curve. You can't just do the things the same way and magically drive down the cost of work and increase the cost of productivity. Or you can't. It doesn't work that way. Or you can try it and you might get some productivity gains, but it's going to take too long to make a difference.

[B]

Yes. With the kind of op tempo that organizations have today, you can't afford to just gradually get a little bit more efficient with your job every day and then magically become a manager that gets promoted. If you want to make meaningful change, you have to change what you do and not just hope for greater efficiencies leading to that greater effectiveness. A long slow line, like a 1 degree slope out to the right, measuring the work you have to put in in order to get the necessary level of effectiveness. You have to try something you're not going to be immediately good at. This is one of the tenets of being a professional. Learning to do things differently and better and fighting through the discomfort of learning something and as Sarah said, sucking at it. And so you can get better and when you do things differently, you're just not going to be good at it. And it's okay to not be good at it in the beginning.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. That's a really hard, a really hard thing for many managers to, to live with, to deal with. Folks, you're insecure, right? We're afraid of making mistakes in front of our directs.

[B]

That's a big one. I agree.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. But there's a big lesson here. Doing things differently in the pursuit of excellence and doing them poorly initially is not making a mistake. It's not a sign of weakness to struggle to get better. The true sign of weakness, folks, is just not trying.

[B]

You know, I write all of our podcasts, manager tools and executive tools. I edit career tools, and there are very few times that I put something in bold. But that sentence you said there, that one isn't in bold. Okay? Doing things differently in the pursuit of excellence and doing them poorly initially is not making a mistake. It is not a sign of weakness to struggle to get better. The true sign of weakness is not trying. Yeah, so good. So that's why in the manager tools rollout, we recommend after you've done 12 weeks of one on ones building trust. Building trust. Building trust. We recommend you give only positive feedback for the first eight weeks after you introduce the feedback model to your directs. This is to let you practice with the model and get good at it before you start using it for negative feedback.

[A]

Exactly. But again, the larger lesson here is if you want to be a professional, effective manager and you think there are things you can do better, you're going to have to take the risks of doing things a little bit differently and knowing you're not going to be good at them. Don't worry that you're not good. Of course you're not good. You've never done this before. Sure, maybe they'll rib you a little bit. They might tease you a little bit. You might even get a little bit of pushback, though. Pushback about positive feedback is exceptionally rare. Exceptionally. But worry about that without trying new things and stumbling in the beginning. You'll never get better if you don't try.

[B]

Ever keep swinging. Okay, you want me to summarize?

[A]

Yeah, Wrap it up.

[B]

Sure. Delivering negative feedback is hard, folks. We know it. It's especially hard if you haven't done it and even harder if you haven't experienced it from a boss who is a manager, tools manager, or someone else who's happened to stumble on a way to do it in a way. As somebody once said, the ability of a manager. The really great managers know how to step on your shoes and still leave a shine. There's low trust. You didn't like it when your boss gave it to you. You've tried before and failed, and that's okay. There's not enough corresponding positive feedback. Your directs. Previous bosses were horrible at giving feedback. Your directs didn't like that any more than you did. And too many managers don't get briefed in advance. Or too many managers don't give briefings in advance or have enough practice to get good at it before they quit. But all of these can and should be overcome. Build trust through one on ones first. Brief your people. That's what you would want. Be candid that you're new and won't be perfect at it right away any more than anyone else is really good at something right away. Don't overreact to pushback. Your directs have plenty of bad experiences themselves. They're not attacking you. They're responding from their lived experience. And accept that kind of pushback as the cost of change and getting better. And as the famous TV spokesperson once said about eating oatmeal, it's the right thing to do.

[A]

Thank you, Mark. That was great.

[B]

My pleasure, sir. That was a lot of fun. It's 20 years and we hadn't done that task. I don't know how. There's so much more to mine in all of our guidance.

[A]

That's all for this week, folks. Thank you so much for joining us. Join us again next week as we begin a new topic. Bye, everyone.

[B]

Bye, everyone.