It is hard to remotely give feedback at work. Due to the lack of context in an email, we don’t have some cues to help us understand the context of what is being said. That lack of context is a fertile ground for misunderstandings.
So, do you want to know how to deliver constructive feedback to your Eureka virtual assistant? We hope you find this advice useful.
1. Do not give feedback by email or chat
As we already said, in any written form there is some context missing. Hence, we should avoid giving feedback by writing. Otherwise, your virtual assistant will lack a lot of nuance to interpret the context of what you said.
However, don’t make phone or video calls just to deliver bad news. You don’t want your virtual assistant to think there is bad news whenever you zoom. Use phone or video calls as a regular tool of communication.
2. Don’t use the feedback sandwich
The feedback sandwich is a very known technique. It consists of a person sandwiching some negative feedback between 2 positive comments
The technique is so widespread and expected that workers already know it. Hence, when you start with positive feedback, their mindset will be “Gosh, what did I do wrong?”.
3. Give good feedback regularly
Get used to always giving feedback. As business owners or managers, you shouldn’t take the good work for granted. For that reason, you should point it out whenever your virtual assistant does a good job. That will get them used to receiving feedback from you.
4. If you need to give negative feedback, signal your good intentions.
Explain to your VA that there are some issues, but that you want to point them out so they can improve. If you believe some of that feedback might be hard to hear, you should say so.
However, keep in mind that your feedback should be professional. If you are feeling some emotion, you should step back for a while. In this case, think about how to communicate what the problem is and how it should be dealt with before speaking.
