Dr. Marshall Goldsmith He was recognized in 2011 as the #1 leadership thinker in the world at the bi-annual Thinkers50 ceremony sponsored by the Harvard Business Review. He is the million-selling author of books, including the New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers, MOJO and What Got You Here Won't Get You There – a WSJ #1 business book. His books have been translated into 28 languages and become bestsellers in ten countries. He will present a Master Class on June 9th at Asia HRDCongress 2014 and deliver the opening keynote on June 10th. For further details visit www.hrdcongress.com I have been captivated for years by his Feedforward instead of Feedback principle. Providing feedback has long been considered to be an essential skill for leaders. As they strive to achieve the goals of the organization, employees need to know how they are doing. They need to know if their performance is in line with what their leaders expect. But there is a fundamental problem with all types of feedback: it focuses on the past, on what has already occurred—not on the infinite variety of opportunities that can happen in the future. It is in this context I found his Feedforward exceptionally useful. Feedforward helps people envision and focus on a positive future, not a failed past. Athletes are often trained using feedforward. Racecar drivers are taught to, “Look at the road ahead, not at the wall.” By giving people ideas on how they can be even more successful (as opposed to visualizing a failed past), we can increase their chances of achieving this success in the future. It can be more productive to help people learn to be “right,” than prove they were “wrong.” People do not take feedforward as personally as feedback. In theory, constructive feedback is supposed to “focus on the performance, not the person”. In practice, almost all feedback is taken personally (no matter how it is delivered). Feedforward is based on the assumption that the receiver of suggestions can make positive changes in the future. Feedforward can cover almost all of the same “material” as feedback. Feedforward tends to be much faster and more efficient than feedback. In summary, he says his intent is not to imply that leaders should never give feedback or that performance appraisals should be abandoned. The intent is to show how feedforward can often be preferable to feedback in day-to-day interactions. Quality communication—between and among people at all levels and every department and division—is the glue that holds organizations together. By using feedforward—and by encouraging others to use it—leaders can dramatically improve the quality of communication in their organizations, ensuring that the right message is conveyed, and that those who receive it are receptive to its content. The result is a much more dynamic, much more open organization—one whose employees focus on the promise of the future rather than dwelling on the mistakes of the past. To register for Asia HRDCongress please email neena@smrhrgroup.com or visit www.hrdcongress.com