How to Use Difficult Feedback for Positive Personal Growth

It can be scary to seek feedback, knowing that if you are to get genuine feedback there are inevitably things you will find out about that you may not want to know. Add to that the difficulty of receiving open feedback in some of the cultures where we work in the humanitarian context, and receiving honest feedback becomes even more challenging. And what do you do once you have received that feedback? How do you incorporate it in a way that improves your relationship with your coworkers, rather than straining it?

My guest today Claire Charamnac thought she had a really positive relationship with her team when in actuality, due to cultural and personality differences, they felt a bit differently. I was working with Claire at the time, and although I had heard from a few of her team members that they did not feel trusted by her, (something we really valued on our team) I also knew she needed to receive this feedback directly from them if it was to really have an impact on her.

So how could we have the team give honest feedback to Claire when the culture is non-confrontational? Well we used a multi-rater feedback tool.

I have used this tool several times and can be super effective in getting feedback you may not otherwise receive. Through this survey you get anonymous totals ranking different aspects of your leadership and ability to work with others.

In this interview Claire shares how the multi rater feedback tool helped her to understand her team better, and how you can handle difficult feedback so that you grow personally and improve your relationship with your team. And this is exactly what she did.

If you’re interested in a similar version of the multi rater feedback tool we used, I am going to include it with this week’s email which will go out this Thursday. If you’re not subscribed to the email list and you want the tool along with instructions on how to use it so you can also receive honest feedback from your team, then go to aidforaidworkers.com/podcast/58 and you can find it there.