I am a huge advocate of leaders providing regular feedback to their teams. Coupled with this is the need to provide effective feedback. In our fast-paced world, especially on the retail shop floor, there is very little time for long conversations, therefore the best feedback is short and to the point.
Our two recommended feedback models are, praise, if the team member is doing well and/or improvement feedback, if they need help. Both these models when delivered in the way we have taught them, ensures performance is either maintained or improved. And the good news is they can be delivered in around 7 to 25 seconds.
A recent Gallup article reinforced the absolute need for regular and as they call it “fast and meaningful feedback”. Their research found that when team members received meaningful feedback in the past week, they were 4 times more likely to be engaged. Furthermore, team members are 3.6 times more likely to strongly agree that they are motivated to do outstanding work when their leader provides daily feedback as opposed to annual.
Other benefits identified by Gallup include:
Supports agility – Fast feedback energises team members and enables teams to male real-time, on the fly performance adjustments that create a competitive edge.
Retails talent – Team members today are looking for purpose driven work and a leader who acknowledges and accelerates their progress.
The challenge is always finding time to provide feedback, along with changing the leader’s mindset to place providing feedback as a priority. It’s clear that the positives of moving to regular fast feedback far outweigh any negatives.
Roger Simpson – CEO, The Retail Solution and Author of “The Ultimate Retail Sales Experience” With over 35 years’ industry experience, Roger Simpson is recognized as Australia’s #1 Authority on customer ROI in the retail industry and as a global expert on staff coaching, customer service, and selling skills.
