THE ART OF FEEDBACK: WHO TAUGHT YOU?

Feedback is a bit of an art form. And there are as many different types of mentorship and coaching as there are soldiers in the Army. So how do you effectively train leaders as they come up through the ranks to provide effective, honest feedback and evaluations that are in the macro sense uniform and evenly applied across the force. Michael Shaw has looked at the problem and is the first to admit that he doesn't have all the answers, but he's got some great suggestions about resources that are already out there. There's no doubt the Army has mastered the bureaucratic process of evaluations but in this day and age can the service tolerate a system that isn't optimized to find, develop and advance talent wherever it's found - and not just in the top block.