Feedback is oxygen for learning. Without it, progress suffocates.
If you want your trainees to transfer what they’ve learned into their work, build feedback into every step of the journey. Otherwise, they’re flying blind.
Ask yourself:
- Who gives the trainee feedback at each stage?
- Do those people know how to give feedback that is timely, specific, and constructive?
- Do they understand how much their words shape the trainee’s confidence and behaviour?
- How do you make sure feedback comes from more than one source or perspective?
And remember, the environment itself gives feedback too… when it’s visible.
A nurse washing their hands can’t see whether the bacteria are gone. The results are invisible, and any consequential infection, for them or their patients, appears days later. That’s feedback with a time delay, and that delay kills learning.
Your job is to make feedback visible and immediate – whether it comes from people, data, or the work environment.
What could you change in a current learning programme to make the right feedback show up faster?
