Don’t like giving difficult feedback? Change your mindset.
Giving feedback doesn’t have to mean being aggressive with your lab members, nor does it mean you have to be overly friendly to them. It just means, helping your directs to reach their goal. Therefore, you have to change your mindset. There are three mindsets that tend to exacerbate the difficulty of giving feedback as a manger; Fights, Failures, & Focus.
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Remember to always focus on the success of the science, and to let that focus manage your decisions. Remind yourself that the science is the main goal. It will help adjust your mindset about the importance of giving all types of feedback. Believe that it is for the betterment of the research vision.