15 Best Examples of Honest Employee Feedback for Managers

Imagine a day at work without any supervision or a lack of good management. Do you still think that employees and teams will work as efficiently as they do? Do you believe the work environment will remain as calm as it has always been? The responses to these questions stress on the importance of having someone overseeing teams and guiding them in the right direction. That is where the manager comes in.  

However, for managers to become thought leaders, it is necessary to hold regular performance reviews. Providing your manager with helpful and positive feedback can inspire them to keep up their excellent work. Managers are the closest to their teams, and when you empower them, you empower the entire team as a result. Read on to understand why managers need the right feedback.   

The Ultimate Guide To Mastering Continuous Feedback

Importance of Constructive Feedback for Managers 

Leadership is all about perception, according to John Baldoni, a leadership consultant, coach, and author of Lead Your Boss: The Subtle Art of Managing Up. If managers don't know how they're regarded at work, their performance will suffer.  

A manager, like any other employee, thus has the responsibility to upskill and develop themselves based on what they learn over time. Although upward feedback isn’t widespread at most workplaces, making it a practice will help senior management officials grow into influential leaders. Managers can do so by receiving regular feedback from their teams. Constructive feedback can help them to:   

• Create clearer goals
• Supervise their team better
• Plan resource usage more accurately 

• Boost motivation 
• Aid personal development
• Strengthen the employee-manager relationship
  

Learn More: The 30 Best Employee Feedback Examples in 2022

Related Resources

Related Resources

Characteristics of Honest and Constructive Feedback 

We live in a feedback-driven world. Look around you, every app you use, every experience you have, you rate it against some scale. It is the same for individuals at work. The ratings or reviews enable them to perform better next time. When made into a continuous process, this can drastically improve the quality of work delivered. But not all feedback is constructive feedback; therefore, it is essential to understand what makes feedback honest and helpful. The following are some stark characteristics that distinguish honest feedback from mere opinions:  

• For feedback to be effective, it must be specific and not generalized. The more specific you can be, the more likely the person receiving the comments will grasp what went wrong and where they can improve. Refrain from making any ambiguous statements.  
• Constructive feedback is straightforward and result-oriented. It also implies that such feedback would focus on the problem rather than the individual. Do not beat around the bush; rather, just clearly and concisely state whatever the feedback is.   
• Good feedback is timely and occurs at regular periods.  
• A positive tone is always present in constructive feedback. Humans naturally tend to emphasize the bad and focus on problems rather than triumphs.  In our haste to criticize, we may overlook the things we liked. If the positive is acknowledged first, the bad is more likely to be heard and addressed.  

• It is factual in that it provides evidence based on observed behavior and performance, emphasizing the strengths and limitations of that particular individual.  
• It is decorous in terms of the usage of language, actions, and behavior.   
• Constructive feedback always comes with a clear actionable. It is not just about pointing out the positives and negatives but taking action in the direction of improvement.    

If you're unsure how or what to write as feedback for your manager, below are a few samples to help you out.

Learn More: Everything You Need To Know About Constructive Criticism

Here Are the 15 Examples of How To Give Feedback to Managers

1. Your ability to put things in perspective has always pushed my team and me to do our best job and strive for perfection.  
2. It's incredible how you've managed to pull the entire team together. I admire the fact that you advocate for us, that you are aware of our mental health, and that you give attention to our thoughts, no matter how insignificant they may be.  
3. I understand that striking a good balance takes time and effort, but I like the management approach you employ with me, and I see myself thriving with this level of participation.  
4. I'd want to express my gratitude for your constant passion and willingness to pitch in whenever the team requires any advice. That kind of leadership is highly motivating for us.  
5. Our team has done exceptionally well this year, and I believe part of that is due to your ability to improve morale when we've been down. I want to express my gratitude to you for going above and beyond to keep everyone's spirits up.  
6. I find myself extremely fortunate to be a part of your team. Your management style is commendable and has helped us meet our targets on time. However, there’s one request that I want to make. Could we have more frequent in-office meetings, maybe thrice a week, because physical interaction is always better than virtual? It saves a lot of time.  
7. I understand that it's the end-of-year and that you are mostly all caught up, but I miss our monthly check-ins. I have made significant progress on my courses, and I am ready to apply for projects as early as this month. I can even assist in some critical project tasks with little supervision, but I would like to meet with you more frequently to discuss the opportunity.  
8. You are truly inspirational in terms of the number of excellent projects you support and the resources you make available to everyone. Your dedication to assisting us in our development demonstrates your compassion and thoughtfulness, evident in all you do!  
9. You've provided me with excellent opportunities and mentoring thus far, but I believe there's much more I could be doing for the company right now. What improvements can I adopt to make myself a more valuable team member?  
10. I applaud your desire to engage in open communication, which helps resolve all concerns in a shorter amount of time. However, there is one concern that I would like to bring to your attention. We've had several new individuals join the team, so it would be wonderful to host team-building events so that everyone gets to know one another and feels like they're a part of the team.  
11. I appreciate your faith in me and our team, but I believe that some more specific directions would benefit everyone in the long term.  
12. I admire your commitment to recognizing our achievements and expressing gratitude for your excellent work. Your encouraging words make me feel good about what I've achieved.  
13. I'm a little stressed out with my present workload, and I believe it's because tasks have been spread unfairly. To finish my work on time, I need your help in reducing my workload.  
14. I appreciate that you kept me informed about our latest assignment this week. It helped me better communicate with our stakeholders, and I'm happy to report that we're very much on schedule. It's also fascinating to observe how you work, and the efficiencies you're introducing are impressive.  
15. Our most recent marketing campaign performed as planned, but I believe we can achieve even better outcomes while staying under our budget constraints. Cutting 20% of our print marketing spend and shifting it to our internet campaign could help us gain more awareness and market share. I would appreciate it if you could give this a thought.   

Start Capturing Honest & Constructive Employee Feedback  

A recent survey by Zety revealed that 57% of respondents wouldn’t report interpersonal challenges with their manager. This could seriously hamper their productivity and impact their satisfaction levels at work. Regular discussions between the manager and an employee must be held for this to not happen. Employees shouldn’t shy away from offering feedback to their superiors. Owing to the immense benefits of upward feedback, it is being increasingly adopted by many of the world's leading organizations.  

To make this an automated process, Darwinbox offers a robust performance management system so that you can track the performance of your employees & managers systematically and make excellence a habit. It provides multiple types of feedback options and multiple performance appraisal methods to make your job extremely straightforward.   

Also, you may take inspiration from the above-listed samples the next time you decide to provide feedback to your manager. Let us know any ideas that you might have to make this process more seamless.