Giving feedback with SBI

SBI is Situation, Behavior, Impact. It keeps feedback about observable events instead of character judgments. The same skeleton works for praise, peer reviews, and upward feedback.

Give feedback privately for corrective topics, publicly for praise when it will not embarrass. Give it soon, while the tape is still rolling. Softening into mush ("maybe sort of consider…") helps no one. Be kind and clear.

Walking through SBI

Optional fourth beat: ask / request — "Can we try stacking questions at the end?" or "What was your read of that moment?"

Praise uses the same structure. "Great job" is empty. "In the incident channel at 14:10 you posted impact and next update time — that kept three managers from pinging us" is fuel people can reuse.

With managers, focus on support you need: "When goals change without a written update, I optimize for the wrong milestone for days." Upward feedback belongs in the 1:1 first. Put it in a formal cycle only after you have tried live conversation, unless the process requires a written form and anonymity is the point.

When the company asks you to write peer reviews, invest thirty focused minutes. Calibrators read dozens of forms. Vague warmth is noise. One reusable shape:

1. Scope of collaboration — project, reviews, on-call.
2. One strength with evidence — SBI or a shipped outcome.
3. One growth edge — kind, specific, actionable; skip only if you truly have no signal.
4. Leveling signal if asked — map to the rubric without playing manager.

If you cannot say something honest and useful, decline the peer request rather than inventing filler. Empty praise can hurt them in calibration by looking like a plot to inflate. Surprising someone only in a closed calibration is cowardice: if you have concerns, say them with evidence.

Common mistakes

• Character labels. "Dismissive" is not a behavior. The interruption is.
• Empty praise. "Great job" cannot be reused.
• Correcting in public. Shame trains hiding, not change.

Check yourself

You want to say someone is dismissive in meetings. Recast it.

Situation + behavior + impact: yesterday's review, two interruptions during latency numbers, the thread died and Priya stopped contributing.

A peer request you cannot write honestly. What do you do?

Decline it. Empty praise can hurt them in calibration.

Key takeaways

• SBI: situation, behavior, impact — then a request.
• Praise specifically; correct privately; give it soon.
• Peer writeups need one strength, one edge, and evidence.
• Decline a peer request rather than invent filler.

Further learning

Feedback resources for managers (Lara Hogan)Many of us fear messing up these awkward (yet important) conversations. But everyone deserves clear feedback!larahogan.me

Kim Scott on Radical Candor — care personally while challenging directly:

Next: brag documents.