Do you ask your boss for feedback?

Q: When is the last time you asked your boss for feedback about your work?

Nick's reply: Kudos to those readers who ask for feedback from the boss without waiting for review time. I'm worried about those who don't bother at all, or who wait for the boss to tell them how they're doing. Feedback is an important part of doing a job well. In fact, feedback is so fundamental a control mechanism throughout our lives that I wonder how people could miss its significance in their careers.

Almost every life science (biology, psychology) involves the study of feedback. I remember an unusual question on a biology exam in college: Why do animals have their brains at the front of their bodies rather than on the back end or in the middle? The answer is that an animal's sensory apparatus (eyes, ears, etc.) is centered around the brain, and the brain, being the processor of sensory input, is at the part of the body that goes first when the animal moves.

Why is that important? Because survival depends enormously on the ability to process input quickly. When an animal moves forward, instant feedback about the results of that action is crucial to the animal's survival. (Man's brain is on top of his body because that's where the most important sensory input arrives: a few feet off the ground. Or so we're told.)

Imagine what would happen to a horse galloping toward the edge of a cliff. If its brain and sensory apparatus came last, the animal would likely go over the cliff before it could process the visual input that serves as feedback about its forward motion.

This is why, when you're doing your job, it helps to gather feedback early and often -- to help you avoid going over the cliff. There's very little difference between that horse and the employee who fails to get regular feedback and is fired for not doing the work in the way expected. Studies have shown that people who ask for feedback tend to do a job the way the boss wants it done, and they tend to get promoted. Even more interesting is that younger workers seem to ask for feedback more than older workers. (They get promoted more often, too.)

Asking your boss "How am I doing?" doesn't imply that you lack confidence. It shows that you're trying to do the job the way the boss wants it done. While you may have great suggestions about how to do the work better, what matters most is that you talk to your boss and listen to what the boss has to say. That is, you must work together, and that requires robust feedback.

Don't wait for your boss to tell you how you're doing. Ask, and ask often.

Copyright 2008. Distributed by Universal Press Syndicate

Nick Corcodilos is author of "Ask The Headhunter: Reinventing the Interview to Win the Job" and the host of www.asktheheadhunter.com. He can be reached by e-mail at seattle@asktheheadhunter.com or at North Bridge Group, P.O. Box 600, Lebanon, NJ 08833. Sorry, no personal replies.