How data changes behavior
Updated: Mar 25
The leaders I work with tend to deal with the same issues, so I thought this might be relevant for you, too.
One of the things I'm seeing right now is that many people don’t get the quality or quantity of feedback that they would like from their manager.
Our efforts follow our attention. This is a core tenant of both business intelligence and behavioral change. It’s why we create data dashboards, senior leaders have annual strategic planning sessions, and measuring billable hours can be a bad idea.
Feedback loops are how we know where to put our effort, and if we don’t get feedback from the right source, we risk having our attention drawn to the wrong things.
Want to connect to talk about change management or coaching?
Complex Problems
Managers are plagued by unsolvable complex problems. In coaching, I guide managers to identify the problem, figure out a simple course of action, observe outcomes, and adjust. Problem: unactionable feedback Do you receive generic unactionable feedback like “work on your executive presence,” or “you need to improve your communication”? These are worthy aspirations, but they aren't specific behaviors. Consider yourself lucky if you get specific, behavioral-focused, actionable feedback from your supervisor (even if it hurts to hear it). Try this: "What does that look like?" Help your manager give better feedback by asking better questions. You can improve the feedback you get by asking, “what does that look like?” This simple question can provide the prompt they need to be more specific and give them the courage to say exactly what they mean. Repeat this question to identify as many specific behaviors as possible, then pick the one that you want to work on first. This idea – called “Swarm of B(ehaviors)’s” - comes from behavioral psychologist BJ Fogg in his phenomenal book Tiny Habits. Perhaps you aspire to improve your executive presence; some of the behaviors might be “write more succinctly,” “interrupt less during staff meetings,” or “don’t participate in office gossip.” Those are all good changes but pick one with your manager and focus on it for a week. See what changes. Expected outcome: small wins You get actionable, behavior-focused feedback when you ask for it, and your manager gets better at articulating expectations. Look for small, observable behavioral changes and the impact they have around you. Ask yourself and others if this new behavior is contributing to the greater aspiration. This also gives you practice working with qualitative data, which is what is so often missing from data-driven decision-making. If you still aren't getting the feedback you want, slightly adjust the question or seek feedback from someone else who can provide the perspective you need.
What's worked for you?
What I'm working on now
When I'm not coaching, change management has been my focus for the past two months. I was featured on an expert insight series podcast with Blue Margin, co-hosted a training on resiliency through change for a future-leaders cohort within a global enterprise, facilitated an in-person half-day change management workshop for corporate leaders, and attended the Enterprise Agility World Conference where I learned from brilliant people like Paul Gibbons and Dr. Leandro Herrero about the myths plaguing the change management discipline.
What I'm reading now
Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
A fantastic discussion on the biases of intuition, how even the most experienced statisticians make poor judgments about statistical measurements, and why we can’t always be data-driven decision-makers (hint: we’re pretty good at making decisions without much information and we do it extremely fast).
What I'm talking about
Check out my interview with Blue Margin about how data analytics and change management are perfect business partners.
Disclaimer
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