How to give a senior leader feedback (without getting fired)
There’s a right and wrong way to proceed. Here’s how to increase the chances your leader listens and takes action--while reducing the chances they feel threatened.
👋 Hey, it’s Wes. Welcome to my weekly newsletter on managing up, executive communication, and standing out as a higher performer. For more, check out my new intensive course on Executive Communication & Influence.
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I got this question from a student in the October cohort of my course:
I’d love to hear any advice on helping people more senior than me recognize patterns of behavior that are stopping them from getting the results they want.
A few examples:
Not giving clear guidance during a process--then being disappointed with the results
Not setting priorities--then being disappointed their team isn’t working on the right things
Not training new hires--then being disappointed when they take longer to ramp up
Ah, this is a dilemma.
How can you help a senior leader see they’re making life harder for themselves and their team?
If you don’t speak up, you’re robbing your organization of your good insights.
If you do speak up, you might put your employment and well-being at risk.
This puts you in a tough spot.
Today I want to share some ways you can share feedback with senior leaders, or anyone more powerful than you—while being respectful, helpful, and protecting yourself from their wrath.
Giving feedback to someone more powerful than you is a pattern break
Traditionally, the more powerful person gives feedback to the less powerful person.
So if you want to give feedback to a more senior person, it’s an inversion of norms. This causes a moment of potential chaos, which is why you want to control the energy and channel it in a positive direction.
Feeling nervous about giving your senior leader feedback is a good thing. It means you have survival instincts that help with self-preservation.
Giving a senior leader feedback shouldn’t be your first option:
Your first option is to ask yourself, “What can I do that’s within my control to improve this situation?”
Your second option is, “Can I live with this? How much does this bother me? Is it worth giving them feedback and what are my chances of success doing it?”
Your third, fourth, and fifth option: Thinking more about the above
Your final option: “I think I want to give this senior leader some feedback.”
In other words, make sure YOU aren’t the problem. Make sure you are managing up, asking clarifying questions, acting like an owner, etc to get what you need. It’s easy to blame a leader, but before you do that, try reflecting on how you could behave differently to improve outcomes for both of you. It’s low-agency to assume other people should change.
If you do want to give your senior leader feedback, proceed with the appropriate level of caution. You may want to adjust the tactics below based on your specific leader, their idiosyncrasies, worldview, your relationship, the level of trust they have in you, etc.
For example, you might realize your relationship or credibility isn’t strong enough for you to give them feedback—that’s an equally appropriate conclusion.
The only path I’d advise against: Going in with guns blazing, assuming you have moral high ground simply because you are right.
If you are self-aware and could realistically see your senior leader taking the feedback well, read on.
Here’s what I do that might be useful for you too.
1. “Even more” technique
I’ve taught this framework to my clients, and they love it. I’m going to share it with you.
The framing of “even more” works so well because you’re speaking from a place of generosity and giving the benefit of the doubt.
You’re assuming they’re doing X—and that they should do it even more. You are assuming they are great--and you want to make them even stronger.
🚫
You: “We might need to give guidance to new hires.”
Senior leader: “You think I don’t know that I need to give new hires guidance? I obviously gave them guidance. GTFO.”
✅
You: “We may need to give even more guidance to new hires.”
Senior leader: “Hmm yeah. I gave them some guidance, but that probably wasn’t enough.”
Why this works:
The “before” scenario is binary—the senior leader either did or didn’t give guidance. And if they didn’t, well, they messed up. They feel threatened that you noticed.
The “after” is a spectrum: You are generous in assuming that they did give guidance. You’re suggesting they may want to amp this up even more. This is much easier for them to accept.
This isn’t simply an issue of semantics or phrasing. This is about positioning to increase the chances they change their behavior.
Getting anyone to listen and change their behavior, especially someone more senior? That’s a huge win.
[The “even more” technique works with giving feedback to direct reports too. It’s super versatile.]
2. Use yourself as an example
Talk about yourself so it doesn’t seem like you’re pointing fingers. I do this whenever I want to say something the person might find insulting.
🚫 “You should try X.”
✅ “I used to struggle with this, and when I tried X, it really helped.”
By the way, saying “you should try X” is fine--there’s nothing inherently wrong about it. The reason I would avoid it is because of the power dynamic and CONTENT of what I’m saying.
If there’s a power dynamic and/or the content of what I’m saying might be sensitive for the person, that’s when I share about my own experience.
I’m not saying YOU are struggling with X, I’m saying I used to and what I did. And if that lesson applies to what you’re dealing with, that’s cool, but no pressure.
3. Adopt diplomatic, curiosity-forward language
Most people are extreme in one of two ways:
They think “respecting the person’s power” means being 100% supplicant. They do everything the powerful person says, and never push back even when they have reason to. → These people are spineless.
They share their POV in the most blunt, low-finesse way without any regard for their recipient’s person’s ego. They think, “Well, I’m right, so I should just say the thing with zero framing.” → These people are insubordinate.
Both are bad. Both lack judgment.
What you want to do is: Share your POV in a way that doesn’t threaten the senior person, and gets them to listen.
One simple way you can achieve this is by using diplomatic, curiosity-forward language.
These phrases help you ease into the suggestion in a way that feels non-threatening:
"We might want to try…”
“I wonder if...”
"Perhaps we could...”
“What are your thoughts on...”
“One approach might be...”
You adopt the vibe of a helpful team member who has your leader’s best interest in mind and wants to serve your organization.
You are forward-looking. Instead of focusing on what went wrong (which risks making your leader feel defensive), you’re focused on what to potentially do going forward.
4. Bring data and examples to support your point
If you've been reading this newsletter for a minute, you know I bang on the drum of sharing your logic. I believe most people do not share their rationale enough.
Don’t just make a high-level, hand-waving statement.
Instead, share examples of what worked well in the past because it helps your feedback land. Supporting your claims makes you more persuasive and objective--and increases the chances your senior leader will take your recommendation.
Example 1: Guidance during projects
🚫 “We need to give more feedback during projects.”
✅ “I noticed when we reviewed the design mockups weekly with the client, they loved the final result. For this project, early check-ins could help us make sure we’re aligned before going too far down a certain direction and could prevent rework.”
Example 2: Setting priorities
🚫 “The team needs clearer priorities.”
✅ “The team made amazing progress when we all focused on the website update last month. It might help to have one or two clear priorities for the team this month that everyone can rally behind.”
Example 3: Training new hires
🚫 “We should spend more time training new people.”
✅ “When we were able to dedicate that first week to training Steve, he got up to speed pretty quickly. The bit of upfront time seemed to have paid off, and taking a similar training approach for our next hire could help them ramp up just as fast. What do you think?”
Why this works:
Ends with a clear, actionable suggestion
Shows the upside of updating their approach
Keeps it simple, logical, and positive
Personally, I think phrasing a recommendation as a statement reduces cognitive load. You can follow up with an open-ended question, like “what do you think?”
Notice how the examples above are concrete AND concise. Avoid long diatribes and over-explaining—use your judgment to share just enough context.
And for goodness sake, do not have a “well actually…” vibe when you share logic and data. This is obnoxious and will probably backfire. Notice how in the examples above, I’m sharing rationale, and doing it in a collaborative way.
To recap, here are the points:
Deploy the “even more” technique
Use yourself as an example
Adopt a diplomatic, curiosity-forward language
Bring data and examples to support your point
Which principle above do you want to try? Which do you think will work best with the senior leader you have in mind and why? Hit reply because I’d love to hear from you.
Thanks for being here, and I’ll see you next Wednesday at 8am ET.
Wes
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Ohhh that’s a really great one! As you can guess, I’m the ‘too blunt’ type. I’ve been told multiple times to ‘stop telling me how to do my job’.
The default of many people is to complain to their own manager, expecting them to tell that person the feedback (or raise it even higher). I’ve been doing it for a while, and I found it’s not effective at all (either my feedback is not passed, or nothing happens afterward).
I agree about being cautious here, especially if that leader is multiple levels above you. Still, I think that being known as the ‘cheeky’ person is not that bad. Even as people got a bit mad, they appreciate I cared enough to say something. Using your tips, there is much less chance of a mistake! :)
One obvious tip is to always do it on a 1:1 setting, and NEVER lash out in a meeting. Yep, I’ve done that mistake too 😅
I recently talked with the VP product about being more open to ideas that come from engineers. Sadly this article didn’t exist yet, so I used none of the above, and the approach I took is to be direct and respectful.
I started with a Slack message: “hey Brian, could I have 10 minutes of your time at the office tomorrow to share some thoughts I have?”. I got an easy yes.
Then in the meeting I asked if it’s ok I’ll be direct, and just shared it as it is “I’m a little frustrated about how ideas from my engineers are ignored. I appreciate your pragmatic approach, and I know you have good reasons for the decisions, but when they we raise an idea and hear nothing back about it, it can be really frustrating. Is there a better approach you would like us to use when having a some thought about a product decision?”
It was not ideal, but it worked nicely. He acknowledged his tendency to do the thinking behind close doors and not sharing the results, and invited me to tell everyone to just follow up with him personally if they feel their ideas was ignored.
I love how you indicated that giving feedback to somebody more senior than you should be the last resort!
Indeed, I have seen people destroying their career at a firm because they kept giving feedback to everybody else, including their bosses... except themselves.
"When everyone has a problem with John, then John is the problem"