How to Give Feedback That Actually Changes Behaviour: A Leader’s Guide
Most leaders know, intellectually, that feedback is essential. It’s how people grow, how performance improves, and how organisations learn. And yet the vast majority of feedback given in organisations is either too vague to act on, too rare to matter, or delivered in a way that triggers defensiveness rather than reflection.
Giving feedback that actually changes behaviour is one of the most underrated leadership skills — and one of the most learnable. This post explores why so much feedback fails, what the research tells us about what works, and a practical framework for delivering feedback that leads to real, lasting change.
Why Most Feedback Doesn’t Work
It’s Too Vague
“You need to be more proactive.” “Your communication could be better.” These are observations, not feedback. They tell the recipient what conclusion you’ve reached, but not what specific behaviour you’ve observed, why it matters, or what you’d like to see instead. Vague feedback gives people nowhere to go.
It’s Too Infrequent
If the only time people receive feedback is in an annual review, you’re not running a feedback culture — you’re running a reporting culture. Feedback needs to be close enough to the event to be meaningful. Six months after a project went off the rails is not the time to debrief on what went wrong.
It Triggers the Threat Response
The human brain responds to criticism in the same way it responds to physical threat — with defensiveness, denial, or withdrawal. If feedback is delivered in a way that feels like an attack on identity, the recipient shuts down. Their cognitive capacity narrows. The message is lost.
What the Research Tells Us About Effective Feedback
The most robust finding in the feedback literature is that the quality of the relationship determines the quality of the feedback. People are far more likely to hear, accept, and act on feedback from someone they trust and respect. The work of building a strong relationship is not separate from giving good feedback — it is the prerequisite for it.
Research also consistently shows that the most effective feedback focuses on behaviour, not personality. “You interrupted three people in that meeting” is something the recipient can act on. “You’re arrogant” is something they can only defend against.
A 5-Step Framework for Giving Feedback That Changes Behaviour
Step 1: Create the Right Conditions
Timing and environment matter enormously. Feedback given in the heat of the moment, in a shared open-plan space, or immediately before a high-stakes event is rarely effective. Choose a private, calm setting. Give the recipient a heads-up that you’d like to have a feedback conversation — this allows them to enter the conversation in a receptive rather than defensive state.
Step 2: Describe the Specific Behaviour
Start with observable facts, not interpretations. What did you actually see or hear? “In yesterday’s client meeting, you interrupted the client twice while they were explaining their concern” is specific and factual. “You never listen” is a generalisation that will immediately provoke defensiveness. The more specific and factual the observation, the less room there is for dispute — and the more there is for genuine reflection.
Step 3: Explain the Impact
Connect the behaviour to its consequences — on the team, on the client, on the business, or on you. “When you interrupted the client, I could see them becoming frustrated, and I think we lost the room at that point.” Impact explains why the feedback matters and gives the recipient a reason to care about changing.
Step 4: Ask Before You Tell
Before jumping to advice or solutions, get curious. “What was going on for you in that moment?” creates space for the recipient to reflect and often surfaces context you didn’t have. It also shifts the conversation from something being done to them to something they’re a participant in.
Step 5: Agree on Specific Next Steps
Feedback without agreement on what changes is just observation. End every developmental feedback conversation with clarity about what specifically will be different going forward. A simple “So what are you going to do differently next time?” is often enough to convert a conversation into a commitment.
Feedback as a Leadership Culture
The culture of any organisation is a direct reflection of the behaviours its leaders model. If you as CEO give candid, respectful, behaviour-focused feedback regularly — and actively invite feedback on your own performance — you give everyone around you permission to do the same.
The inverse is also true. If feedback only flows downward, happens rarely, or is associated with criticism and consequences, people will avoid it. They’ll let problems fester. Performance will suffer quietly, without anyone quite saying why.
Receiving Feedback Well
One final point that is often overlooked: the most important thing a leader can do to improve the feedback culture is to model how to receive feedback well. Self-awareness is a leadership superpower — and it requires being genuinely open to hearing things about yourself that are uncomfortable.
When someone gives you feedback, resist the urge to explain or defend. Listen fully. Ask questions. Say thank you. Show that you’ve taken it seriously by doing something different. That behaviour, visible to your team, creates more psychological safety and honest feedback culture than any training programme ever could.
