SIMPLE WAYS TO PROVIDE
Positive And Public Feedback.
It's common to come across designers who struggle with confidence. And often they'll feel like it's all on them. And no doubt there's a certain level of personal responsibility. BUT, some of that needs to be shouldered by their leadership.
And as leaders, giving public positive feedback is one of the easiest ways to boost confidence. If a member of your team does something well, even if it's small, call it out. In fact, often the smaller acts are the best acts to call out.
A few ways I did this in the past:
USE YOUR TOOLS.
We use various tools besides email nowadays to communicate. From communication tools like Slack or Teams, to design tools like Figma and Miro.
All provide a great way to provide positive feedback.
Call It Out On Slack
Or whatever communication tool your team uses. It's a public space. You don't need to make a big deal of it. A simple "@name hey great job on the presentation this morning, you rocked it!" will do.
Even better, get specific:
"@name hey great job on the presentation this morning, you rocked it! You nailed the Results slide and the way you handled the questions at the end was great."
It doesn't take much.
EVERYBODY EVERYWHERE
If you’re a design leader, don’t limit your feedback to just the designers. Include the wider product development team when you seem them doing good. It’s about the wider team and doing so shows you care.
SNEAK THEM IN
When someone higher up calls out something about the product they like, this gives you an opportunity to shout out your designer who contributed. I wouldn’t force it, but usually there’s a thread off the comment where you can sneak in a “and shout to @designer for crushing the design!”
COMMENTS ARE YOUR FRIEND
Figma / Google Docs / Miro / Etc comments are a public space. Others will see them. It’s a great place to - add design feedback obviously - but also provide general positive feedback.
BUt Why
Focus on the why. It’s tempting to drop a simple emoji, or something short like “cool” or “this design is great”. Or you may get a little more specific: “I love this gradient” or “really love this interaction.”
All fine and good. And in small doses, it’s ok. But you want to teach/coach when you can. Adding a bit more context as to why you like that interaction, or what makes that gradient good goes a long way.
Collaboration
Look for opportunities to provide positive feedback to those outside design as well. Figma can be a bit of a wary place at times. Sometimes product managers may not feel totally comfortable in there. Sometimes designers don’t want product managers lurking.
Your job as a design leader is to foster that collaboration. Leading the way and showing others outside of design that’s it cool they are in Figma, and even welcomed, is a great way to foster this collaboration.
Getting Sticky With It
I know I said get detailed above, but sometimes just a sticker / emoji works great.
IN MEETINGS
Meetings are a great place to sneak in positive feedback given the face to face (even if it is on Zoom) nature.
General Team Meetings
Every Friday I would have a team meeting and at the end I would do shoutouts. I’d run through slides of screenshots of positive things I’ve seen throughout the week. It could be slack comments from a manager or just good design work. I found the team really appreciated this.
This wasn’t necessarily a go around the room and say what each designer did great this week. It was a run down of what I saw this past week that was positive. Sometimes every designer would be included, often times only some of them.
In retrospect the fact that you weren’t be highlighted for positive feedback every week made it more real. If I made it a point to call everyone out every week it would feel forced.
Ad Hoc
You don’t always have to plan it. In fact, I would say it’s better to fire of positive feedback ad hoc and in the moment. When you see someone do or say something especially good, call it out.
And it doesn’t have to be a dog and pony show. If a designer offers some feedback on design it’ can be simply “hey that’s really good feedback, I like how you thought about the business metrics there.”
Critiques
I’m generally not a fan of critiques nowadays. They feel a bit outdated, out of place, and not quite right.
Buuuuut - they do provide a good place to provide positive feedback. Instead of focusing on on what’s wrong, drop in feedback on what’s right.
A couple TIps To Get IT right
Above are a few ways to go about providing public positive feedback. But, here’s a few tips to dial it in:
Small Doses
You don’t want to over do it. It doesn’t have to be a big presentation or a show. Often the best feedback is subtle. Weaved in throughout the normal day to day.
Catch THem WHen THey Are Good
Be timely with your feedback. Don’t wait too long. Generally the feedback should happen the same week. If you wait to long it 1)loses its power and impact and 2) your designer goes all that time without knowing the positive feedback.
BUILD ME UP BUTTERCUP
Part of giving feedback is to build up your team. You want to identify areas where a team member can grow.
A good tip is to identify where a designer did well in an area they are actively working on.
So if they’re not as confident with real time questions and they did a great job answering questions, that would be a great callout.