Three ways to give feedback that Gen Z can understand
4 MIN READ
“Don’t people want to get better?”
An engineering manager raised her hand at my leadership workshop. She had a problem.
"My Gen Z employees really struggle with taking feedback," she said. “Some of them have great potential, but they get defensive when I offer constructive criticism. They can’t get better if they can’t take advice. I don’t want to fire anyone, but feedback isn’t working.”
How can managers persuade Gen Z to accept feedback?
It’s important to note that most people – regardless of age -- don’t like feedback. Negative feedback makes people resistant to change because it triggers the brain's fight-or-flight response. As a Harvard Business Review article1 points out, our brains respond to critical feedback as a threat. The feedback causes "cognitive, emotional, and perceptual impairment."
This panic is naturally more pronounced among Generation Z employees, who are newer to the workforce and less experienced with handling criticism.
Furthermore, there’s an expectation gap between the generations. If you’re a manager now, probably no one cared about your feelings when you were given feedback. But Generation Z expects managers to nurture their self-esteem. And they were raised to advocate for themselves – which may come off as disagreement and defensiveness.
Here’s a guideline to making feedback more palatable. Focus on helping Gen Z do better, rather than telling them they need to do better.
Focus on helping Gen Z do better,
rather than telling them they need to do better.
Helping is better than telling at reducing defensiveness. Which makes perfect sense: people are more receptive if they feel you’re on their side.
Here are three tips to make feedback to Gen Z more effective:
1. Be a supportive coach instead of a judge. Focus more on helping the person improve, and less on criticism.
2. Deliver negative feedback in a neutral way. Avoid personal attacks and concentrate on the behavior, not the person.
3. Pursue a motivational goal that remedies the problem. Help the person see why their behavior is a problem and what they can do to improve.
Let’s examine these in detail.
1. Be a supportive coach to Gen Z instead of a judge
Begin your discussion by asking for your employee's perspective. This shows that you're coming alongside them to understand the situation. Once you've heard their side of the story, you can share your own observations and feedback. Be sure to be specific and constructive. Use language that emphasizes improvement instead of critique.
Some additional tips:
Be empathetic. Try to understand the person's point of view and what they're going through. Show that you care about their success.
Be specific and constructive. Don't just say "you need to do better." Instead, provide examples of how their performance falls short.
Be positive and encouraging. Direct more attention on the person's strengths and what they can do, and less on their weaknesses. Help them see the potential for improvement.
2. Deliver negative feedback to Gen Z in a more neutral way
Style has a huge impact on how feedback lands with Gen Z. Graceful is better than aggressive. To soften your approach, consider framing your opinions as personal reactions instead of facts. For example, try "I had trouble staying engaged with your speech” instead of "you're a boring speaker." Or instead of saying "your thinking isn't strategic," say "I'm not sure I understand your plan yet. Can you explain it to me in more detail?"
3. Pursue motivational goals that remedy the problem
Enroll your Gen Z employee in the problem-solving process. How would they solve the problem? What goals could they set that would help them get there?
Setting goals together fosters a sense of trust and collaboration with your employee. Even if you struggle to agree on what happened in the past, perhaps you and your employee can agree on what you want to achieve in the future. This approach can help thaw even the most defensive hearts.
As your employee works to improve over time, make sure to monitor progress and adjust plans as needed. Keep your focus on driving action, assessing results, and making adjustments. The plan doesn’t have to be immediately successful, but it’s crucial to move forward in a productive way.
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A few weeks after the workshop, we checked in on our Engineering Manager. “The feedback process we learned in class really helps calm people down,” she said. “They’re more open to suggestion when they see that I’m really on their side.”
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I’d love to hear what you think. What are your tips for giving effective feedback? Please let me know in the comments below.
Tags: #generationZ #leadership #feedback #HBR
1 Harvard Business Review, “The Feedback Fallacy,” March-April 2019.
Dale Wetmore believes the future belongs to leaders who can leverage the Gifts of the New Generation. He’s been building teams and enabling leaders for over 20 years at companies like Microsoft and Amazon Web Services.
See www.giftofnextgen.com for more information.
