She was a bit nervous but she did it anyway. She held the microphone without waving it around and everyone heard what she said. She asked for feedback after making a short presentation to a room full of 260 people. “Was I alright?” She really wanted to know.
We might feel inclined to give strokes. “Yes you were great… brilliant. Sure you were”. That doesn’t help much.
Try this easy tip next time you have to give feedback, give a commendation, a recommendation, and finsih with a commendation. My feedback went something like this:
Commendation:
“I didn’t hear any nervousness in your voice, even though you say you felt it”
Recommendation:
“It was a big room and I noticed you were talking mainly to the people straight ahead of you; next time look at all corners of the room so as to include everyone in what you were saying”
Commendation:
“You knew the three points you wanted to make and you said them clearly so that everyone heard them”.
Three true things. One thing to improve sandwiched between two lots of encouragement to do more of what she was doing brilliantly already. Goes down a treat.