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I'm a big believer in feedback for one simple reason: It gives us a more accurate picture of reality.
No matter how self-aware we are, we all have blind spots and biases. We experience our own leadership from exactly one perspective: ours. Everyone around us sees something different.
That's why one of my favorite leadership exercises is 360 feedback.
The idea is simple: Ask the people above you, beside you, and below you for honest feedback about what it's like to work with you.
Sometimes your blind spots are strengths.
The first time I did 360 feedback, I expected to learn where I needed to improve. I did. But I also learned something equally valuable: what I was already doing well.
Almost everyone mentioned some version of the same thing: I held extremely high expectations for my team—and coached people to help meet them.
This might sound silly, but I'd never thought of myself as someone with particularly high expectations. To me, they were just expectations.
Seeing the same observation again and again helped me recognize it as a distinctive part of how I lead—and something I could cultivate intentionally.
Sometimes we're too close to our own strengths to recognize them.
Conduct your own 360.
Create an anonymous survey and send it to a mix of leaders, peers, and direct reports.
Then ask questions like:
What do I do particularly well as a leader?
What do I bring to a team that's uniquely valuable?
What should I do more of?
What should I do less of?
What is one thing I could change to become a more effective leader?
Where do you see a blind spot I may not recognize?
When am I at my best as a leader? When am I less effective?
What do you think I need to hear that I may not hear often enough?
Look for patterns, not comments.
One person saying you're too direct is a data point. Your boss, three peers, and four direct reports independently describing the same behavior? That's a pattern.
Look for themes—both positive and negative.
Ask yourself:
What surprised me?
Where is there a gap between how I see myself and how others experience me?
What strengths should I lean into?
What one or two behaviors would have the biggest impact if I changed them?
You don't have to agree with every comment or change everything based on what other people say. But get curious about the patterns.
Close the loop.
Once you've analyzed the feedback, tell people what you learned.
"Here's what I heard. Here's what surprised me. Here are the things I want to keep doing. And here are the two things I'm going to work on."
Then work on them.
Because when someone gives you honest feedback, they're taking a risk. How you respond determines whether they'll take that risk with you again.
We all have a story in our heads about the kind of leader we are. Feedback lets us compare that story with how other people actually experience us.
Sometimes the gap shows us where we need to grow. Other times it shows us a strength we didn't know we had. Both make us better leaders.
If you conducted a 360 tomorrow, what do you think your team would tell you that might surprise you?
I'd love to hear your answer. Just hit reply—I read every one.
—Ashley Walton, CMO & Treadmill Desk Advocate
