Real-time feedback is embedded in most technology and automated processes these days. Your GPS app compares your current location to your destination 10 times a second and continually optimizes your route. Still amazing! This simple tool means your navigational performance can now be world-class.
Real-time feedback on people performance is getting better but has a long way to go. One of the key reasons is the imbalance between feedback supply and demand. Economists would call this a market disequilibrium. Wherever supply matches demand, there is market equilibrium -- a free flow of goods and services. But because of feedback disequilibrium, there are supervisors and customers with valuable performance insights never shared – and – there are committed workers anxious to learn and grow, receiving no timely or actionable performance input.
Feedback imbalance has a number of causes. There are organizations who truly value giving and receiving feedback, but who haven’t yet cracked the code on how to do so quickly and simply. It requires tools and processes that are sustainable in a busy workplace. Annual reviews don’t really cut it anymore – laborious, too little too late, and avoided by many who are afraid to say what they really think.
Other organizations may not yet value real-time feedback. Yet their top performers crave regular and meaningful feedback, so they can understand how they are perceived and find ways to grow a little every day. Top performers, especially younger ones, quickly become disenchanted with an environment that doesn’t support their development and career growth.
Evaluate your organization’s supply and demand for meaningful, real-time feedback and make the market adjustments you need. Help your people grow and thrive!