Evaluation Consternation: Perfectionists Unite! Not like that!
If you're a regular here, you know that I describe myself as a recovering perfectionist - but sometimes I'm better at it than other times. I was training productivity a few weeks ago and it reminded me how far I have come from the 'good old days'.
But it prompted to start thinking about this a bit more, because my perfectionism has been triggered quite a bit with the curriculum refresh work I've been doing - and facilitation. I'm going to do a short series of posts about this over the next couple of months, as it gels more in my brain. But I want to start with...
The facilitation problem
I love facilitating, it should come as no surprise that I enjoy sharing knowledge with others and providing them with skills and techniques to improve the way they work and function in the world. Somewhat bizarrely though, I shy away from facilitating soft skills, preferring the tangible work skills like writing, project management, change management etc. And yet, two of my favourite courses I've ever created are about being more confident and dealing with conflict - but we'll get to this.
I enjoy facilitation even though I don't 'excel' at it - I know I could often do better at dealing with challenging people in the room, and I know I err a little on the side of how I like to learn. But I would say this is true of most facilitators. In truth, I enjoy facilitation right up to the point of handing out the course evaluations at the end of the day - this is the problem I have with facilitation, and what triggers my perfectionism.
There are few jobs that exist in the world where at the end of every work day you hand out a sheet of paper to everyone and say "now rate my performance with a few ticks" - think about it? Okay, when you deal with customer service they might ask you to stay on the line to conduct a short survey, but it's not quite the same as standing in the room with everyone while they complete the form.
It's a little soul destroying, and I think it's pretty pointless as well - here's why:
The overly empathetic people won't say anything bad, even if they had an issue
The rationalists will never give you a Strongly Agree because they can think of one small way you might have done it better
The critics have to find something wrong, because they feel it's their job
The annoyed to be doing this often just tick through in one category to get it over and done with
The forced to attend take it as an opportunity to prove they didn't need to be there and got nothing out of it.
And the list could go on. Few people come to that survey without some internal framing that makes their responses not entirely about your training - and yet it becomes all about you.
Evaluation frustration
Now, I think that feedback is an important part of any process, and I encourage it. But some of the feedback people give has nothing to do with me, and the majority of it is somewhat meaningless.
For example, we ask them if there was a good mix of theory and practical, this one drives me nuts! For starters, they aren't learning professionals so how the hell do they know? Secondly, if you have a room of activists (people who like to learn through doing) then there is never enough practical. Thirdly, there has to be some theory that they can't apply, which is why we have group discussions about it, but I've come across many people who don't consider a discussion and sharing experiences as 'practical'.
Really we're asking them if they enjoyed the session and felt there was enough time to try to apply the learning. But there are some subjects that are difficult to apply in the room - productivity is one that comes to mind.
So, I have problems with how this is done, and the fact that we are present when they evaluate us. It's like I'm a performing monkey, and I know I'm not alone in finding it a triggering experience.
The real problem
I gave up regularly reading my evaluations quite early on. If there was a problem in the room and I thought an evaluation would help me understand I'd read it, but largely I would avoid them. Sometimes I am asked to scan them in at the end of the day, and that makes it virtually impossible to not see the overall ratings. Sure, I read the consolidated feedback that comes back a week or so later, but then I have enough distance from the day to take it in my stride.
It took me a while to work out the real problem with this, and it's got to do with my perfectionism and introversion. Let's start with the introversion.
As an introverted facilitator, I give all of my energy to the room - this makes facilitation a very tiring activity, and the better I am at it the more tired I get. So at the end of the day, my energy is spent and that makes me a little emotionally raw. This is how I worked out why I shy away from soft skills - after four days of conducting workplace conflict training and feeling overwhelmed by the experience. I realised that I make myself more vulnerable when teaching soft skills; combined with the energy depletion it's not something I can sustain for multiple days.
Now the perfectionism, which should be fairly self-evident as an issue. I know I'm going to be rated at the end of the day, so there is a part of this that kicks in early. And we're not talking about professionalism here, where I want to create a great experience for others. Nooooo, we're talking about the need to not get anything wrong; to have all the answers. Which is not my job as the facilitator! So, I have to fight that impulse back - and sometimes I don't do as well as I could at that.
And since most humans will focus on the negative comments that are made, it only takes one piece of slightly critical feedback at the end of the day for my perfectionist to bring my nasty inner critic out to play. So I become irrationally self-critical and certain that everyone thought it was a waste of time and I should never facilitate again!
And now
This has become a little easier since I finally broke it all down and started talking to other facilitators about it - all of whom share my hatred of the end of the day evaluation process. I've even called it out in my last two training sessions - "And now we get to the part of the day that makes this job weirder than any other one I've ever had - time for you to rate my performance", I do go on to say it's important for them to give honest feedback so we can improve, blah blah blah. But it makes it feel a little easier, and I think it reminds them that there is a person getting this feedback.
What are the perfectionism triggering parts of your job? When does your negative perfectionist come out in full force? Have you ever isolated it and understood what's going on? I'd love to know where other people struggle in this sort of arena as well. Next time we'll discuss another trigger for my perfectionism, similar but oh so different.