Feedback — both positive and constructive — is a crucial part of building a successful organization. Not only can feedback improve your organization as a whole, but your employees actually want feedback; according to a 2016 article in Forbes , nearly two-thirds of employees said they want more feedback than they’re currently getting.

So we can all agree feedback is a must, but effective feedback doesn’t “just happen.” If you want to use feedback to inspire the best in your team (and yourself!), you need to foster a culture where giving, receiving, and acting on feedback isn’t just tolerated — it’s both expected and embraced.

But why, exactly, is feedback such an important part of building a thriving company? How do you foster that feedback culture within your own organization? And how can you leverage feedback to elevate your team, improve your systems and processes, and take your business to the next level?

Why creating a feedback culture is so important

First things first — before we jump into how to foster a feedback culture within your organization, let’s first cover why feedback is so important.

If you want to build a thriving business, you need to be in a state of constant improvement. However, it can be challenging to identify the areas we most need to work on; because we’re so close to the issue, it can be like we have blinders on.

Feedback can help both employees and leaders get better insights into how their actions, behaviors, and work performance is perceived by the rest of their team. These insights can help them identify areas where they could stand to improve — and act as a catalyst for positive change.

Feedback can also be extremely helpful for leadership. Because leaders are often removed from the day-to-day tasks of their team, it can be challenging for them to identify ways to improve operations.

By gathering feedback from your team, you can get clear insights into what’s working, what’s not working, and how to best improve systems, processes, and workflows to maximize productivity — and make sure your employees have what they need to succeed.

Having cleared that up, how exactly do you then create a feedback culture within your organization? Well, this is how I do it.

1. Be the example

It was Ghandi who said, “you must be the change you wish to see in the world.” And, as a leader, if you want to use feedback to inspire change within your organization, it needs to start with you.

Corporate culture always starts at the top — so if you want your employees to openly give and receive feedback, you need to model that behavior within your leadership.

Create an open door policy and encourage employees to give any feedback on how you, their team, or the organization as a whole can improve. Accept that feedback constructively; don’t get defensive and never make an employee feel uncomfortable or punished for voicing their concerns.

In addition to modeling the right way to receive feedback, you also need to model the right way to deliver it. Make sure that any feedback you give is coming from a place of helping your team improve and grow; feedback should be constructive, not critical. And make sure you deliver as much positive feedback as you do constructive; letting people know what they’re doing right and how they’re succeeding is just as important as cluing them in to opportunities for improvement.

2. Create opportunities for different types of feedback

Not all feedback is created equal. While some team members will feel confident delivering feedback face-to-face, the thought of giving feedback in person will make others extremely uncomfortable.

That’s why it’s so important to create opportunities to deliver feedback in a variety of ways. Offering things like anonymous feedback forms or surveys (in addition to opportunities to share feedback in a more direct way) can help empower all your employees to share their thoughts and insights — even if more direct, face-to-face communication isn’t their style.

3. Build feedback into your day-to-day operations

If you truly want to build a feedback culture — and use feedback to elevate your team and your organization — you can’t reserve feedback for annual reviews or critical situations. Instead, you need to make feedback a core part of your corporate DNA — and build it into your day-to-day operations.

So, for example, if you hold a company-wide meeting, send out feedback forms to your team to ask what they found helpful and what they thought could have been improved. If you roll out a new internal process, check in regularly with your team to see how it’s going (for example, after a week, 30 days, and 90 days) — and then make any necessary changes based on your team’s feedback.

Instead of waiting for an employee’s annual review to deliver insights on their performance, give them real-time feedback on what they’re doing well and how they can improve — and do it often.

When you normalize feedback and build it into your day-to-day operations, it’s much easier for your team to give and receive feedback openly and use it to continually improve — which will help to improve your organization as a whole.

4. Act on it

If your team realizes their feedback isn’t going anywhere, they’re going to stop giving it — and you’re going to lose out on their insights and the opportunity to improve your organization.

So while giving and receiving feedback is a great first step, if you truly want to leverage feedback to grow your team and organization, you have to take things a step further and actually act on that feedback.

If a team member comes to you with constructive feedback, acknowledge it, ask questions to make sure you understand what they feel could be improved or how they want to see things change, and then let them know you’re going to work on the issue. Then, actually do it.

If someone offers feedback that, for whatever reason, isn’t actionable for your company, it’s still important to acknowledge them and explain to them why you can’t implement their feedback. Making sure your employees feel heard is key in fostering a feedback culture — and making sure your team feels empowered to share their ideas and give you the feedback you need to improve your business.

Embrace feedback — and use it to take your business to the next level

Fostering a feedback culture is a must if you want to inspire the best in your leadership, your team, and your organization. And now that you understand how to create that culture and embrace feedback, you can start building feedback into your company’s DNA — and watch it thrive as a result.

So you like our media brand Growth Quarters? You should join our Growth Quarters event track at TNW2020 , where you’ll hear how the most successful founders kickstarted and grew their companies.

How to become a UX designer — no matter what you studied at uni

Beautiful and usable design can be the deciding factor between a successful and a failing business. Great designers are treated like superstars. And it’s so fulfilling to design beautiful things that people love to use. But can you become a designer at all without a degree in design? Will you have to go back to school to pursue the career of your dreams?

In my opinion, yes and no. Based on my own experience, I’m gonna share five pieces of advice that will bring you closer to becoming a designer, no matter what you’re doing right now.

It was during my Bachelor’s thesis that I first came into contact with user research; and after that, I fell in love with anything usability and UX design. Today, I’m a UX Manager and take care of a wide variety of design topics. But when you simply look at my diplomas, you wouldn’t expect any of that, since I hold a B.Sc. in computer science and two engineering degrees.

But how did I do it? How did I start off as a computer science student thinking about a career in software engineering and end up teaching UX design to students at the University of Michigan? What would I tell someone who asks me: I have studied X, which has nothing to do with design, how do I become a designer?

1. Understand that the process is the design

The first step towards becoming a designer is to understand what design really is. Many people still mistake design for visual design. But design isn’t just Photoshop. It’s the entirety of the underlying process, including what the final outcome looks like.

According to Alan Cooper’s About Face , this includes designing behavior , form , and content . Also, it involves a considerable amount of user research because good design cannot happen without a deep understanding of your users.

Design is nothing one person simply makes up and that’s it. You’re always designing for someone by solving a problem together with other designers. I want to give you two quotes to underpin this.

The first one, from my own article “ What is Design Thinking “:

“Design Thinking is the understanding that the process is the design and therefore all people involved, no matter their role, are responsible for creating a product that is useful, functional, aesthetically appealing, and affordable.”

And the second one, by Ana Kraš:

“Design is not decoration. Design is to make something work. Design is a thought process, the solving of a problem.”

2. Read Don Norman’s The Design of Everyday Things

Don Norman is a professor emeritus of cognitive science and headed Apple’s Advanced Technology Group. And he has written the book that tells you all you need to know about the theory of design: the psychological and cognitive backgrounds, how to tell good design from bad, why everything around you is (mostly bad) design, how humans form mental models, the basics of human-centered design, the double diamond model (see below), and much more.

If you want to become a designer, you’ll have to read The Design of Everyday Things .

3. Practice sketching and rapid prototyping (a lot)

While you don’t need Photoshop skills to become a designer, it’s inevitable to sketch a lot. Not only is it fun, but also makes it easier to reason your ideas, never forget an idea in the first place, and to get your creative juices flowing (cf. Boost your creativity with daily sketching ).

Yet, this doesn’t mean your sketches have to look good, as long as they manage to get your idea across in terms of the structure of a product and the interactions you envision. Hence, buy a notebook and scribble as if there’s no tomorrow! Basically, a good UX design can be as little as sketches on a napkin.

As for rapid prototyping , I highly recommend paper prototypes. They’re easy to create, simulate interactivity, and deliver a ton of extremely helpful insights before writing actual code. For more on this, read Marc Rettig’s classic Prototyping for Tiny Fingers .

Moreover, you can create pretty elaborate prototypes using tools like InVision or Balsamiq . Since I have a technical background, I usually just prototype directly in HTML/CSS/JS.

Essentially, you have to play around with all the different possibilities and stick to those you feel most comfortable with. The important thing is: a prototype isn’t polished; it’s meant for collecting feedback quickly and iterating — hence, rapid prototyping .

4. Learn to conduct user research

A huge portion of design consists of user research, both for identifying problems and finding solutions. Hence, it’s indispensable to understand the necessity and value of good research and to be able to conduct proper research.

Depending on the stage of the design process, the methods you use can differ greatly. Early on, they tend to be more qualitative and attitudinal. For instance, you’d do some ethnographic field research to discover user’s pain points and everyday problems. Later, when research questions evolve more around, e.g., the usability of a product, methods become more quantitative and behavioral.

For a nice, comprehensive overview of user research methods, please refer to this article by Christian Rohrer.

Another source I’d recommend for learning about the immense value of user research is Robert Hoekman, Jr.’s Experience Required .

Additionally, there are a plethora of courses to get started with user research available on platforms like Coursera, e.g., one by the University of Michigan .

5. Double delivery

In 2018, I attended “A Conversation with David Kelley” at the University of Michigan. Kelley is one of the founders of IDEO and a professor at Stanford University. Similar to the topic of this article, someone from the audience asked something along the lines of: I work in a non-design job and therefore don’t get assigned any design tasks. How can I manage to be recognized more as a designer?

Kelley answered the following: do what you were asked to do, but do it using a design methodology. This is what he called double delivery .

This means, no matter what job you’re in right now, apply design methods as often as possible and whenever appropriate. You don’t need a so-called “design task” to do design. Sketch, prototype, conduct user research, or employ one of the methods from 5 design methods I’ve successfully applied as a UX Manager at C&A .

A good go-to source for all kinds of methods that I use on a regular basis is IBM’s Enterprise Design Thinking Toolkit .

Conclusion

Becoming a designer can seem like a nearly impossible endeavor if you’ve never formally done anything with design. However, it is possible, regardless of your formal education, even though it will surely take time and effort.

Essentially, anyone who makes something that is used by other people, be it a chair, a mobile app, or a business process, already does design — whether they’re aware of it or not. However, being a designer takes a little more than that.

If you understand what design really is, learn to sketch and prototype, learn to conduct quality user research, and engage in double delivery whenever possible, all doors will be open to you.

So you’re interested in design? Then join our online event, TNW2020 , to explore how technology is changing how we create, experience, and share art.

How your ‘fighting style’ should determine your team

Boris is the wise ol’ CEO of TNW who writes a weekly column on everything about being an entrepreneur in tech — from managing stress to embracing awkwardness. You can get his musings straight to your inbox by signing up for his newsletter!

I didn’t fight a lot as a kid. Or as an adult, for that matter. My preference is to avoid violence as much as possible. This isn’t really about maintaining some noble philosophy, it’s mostly just self-preservation. I would never bet on myself winning a fistfight, ever.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t always avoid violence as a kid. I lived in a pretty good part of town, which just happened to be closer to a ‘not-so-good’ part of town. This meant my path would often overlap with groups of slightly older boys who were on the prowl for an easy target to bully. As a skinny kid with glasses who liked ballet, I was the perfect target.

My primary ‘fighting’ strategy against these groups? Run .

I would run home, or into a store, or even into total strangers’ houses. Usually, that was enough to deter the assailants. But sometimes the stores would be closed or I simply couldn’t get past the group, so I had no choice but to defend myself.

At that point, I’d switch to my true strategy and go on the offensive. I would drop my bag, take off my glasses, and simply charge at the kid closest to me. My theory was that most people would go into a fighting stance and hope to find an opening to throw a punch — while at the same time putting a lot of energy into avoiding getting hit themselves.

I hoped that by accepting I would get hit a few times, I could spend less energy on my defense and focus all my energy on simply throwing punches. Or wailing arms, spitting, biting, and grabbing hair if that was an option. I made no effort to fight fair, and I was outnumbered anyway, so I figured I had some leeway with the informal streetfighting rules.

My strategy would usually result in me getting hurt, but I acted like it didn’t while inflicting whatever damage I could to the attacker. Looking back, I’m not sure if this was a smart strategy or if I’d recommend it to anyone.

However, I recently realized I’ve never really left that strategy. I’ve taken it with me and applied it to many things in my life.

When working on a project, I don’t consider the downsides or deal with all the potential consequences. I simply charge ahead with all my attention and focus on the end goal, without much consideration for what I break in the process. If I make dinner, I’ll happily sacrifice ingredients, packaging, and the occasional plate or two, as I accept the damage to get to the greater good.

Unfortunately for my family, this also applies to home improvement.

The other day I wanted to put up a shelf. My only focus was to GET THE SHELF ON THE WALL. I didn’t empty the shelves below first to avoid damage in the unlikely event I would drop the shelve mid-assembly.

That unlikely event obviously occurred, and I broke a few plates and then cursed myself for not being more careful.

But that’s me. I don’t think about defense and risk-avoidance or even the damage I might do to myself. I go all in, which leads to lots of nice things… and a few bruises and ego issues every now and then.

Why am I telling you this? Because it helps to think about what kind of person you are, and what kind of people you have around you.

Need a task done quick and dirty? Ask me! Do you have a delicate project that needs lots of attention to detail and patience to complete? Well, maybe we need to look at someone else in the team.

Once you know what kind of fighter you are, you can assemble a team around you that complements you.

Can’t get enough of Boris? Check out his older stories here , and sign up for his newsletter here .