The Ultimate Constructive Feedback Tool for Leaders & Managers

What if I told you there's a tool that makes it really easy for your team to give and receive constructive feedback without the awkwardness?

It's called the stop, start, continue exercise and it's perfect for creating a culture of honest, actionable feedback. Whether you're looking to strengthen team relationships or give constructive feedback that actually leads to positive changes, this tool has you covered.

In this episode, I'm going to show you exactly how to use it, plus I'll give you a real world example of how a manager can use this exercise to help someone improve.

Hey everyone, and welcome back to the channel. If you're new here, I'm Doug Howard, and I help leaders and professionals like you develop the skills to build high performing teams and navigate leadership challenges with confidence. On this channel, we dive deep into leadership strategies, team dynamics, and workplace tips to help you grow. If that sounds like something you're into, then go ahead and hit that subscribe button before we get started. And make sure you turn on the notification bells, too, so that you don't miss any future episodes.

Today we're going to explore one of the most effective tools for team building and giving feedback, and it's called the stop, start, continue exercise.

It's a straightforward framework that allows teams to give peer to peer feedback on what actions they should stop, start, or continue doing. It's a powerful way to drive improvement, build trust, and ensure that everyone's working at their best.

What is the Stop, Start, Continue Exercise?

So let's break down what the stop, start, continue exercise is all about. This tool gives people a structured way to provide feedback to their peers, focusing on three main areas.

The first one is stop. These are behaviors or actions that the other person should stop doing because they're not productive or they're not helpful.

The second one is start. These are things that the person should begin doing to improve their effectiveness or improve their overall contributions to the team. What I mean by that is there are things that they're not currently doing, but they should start doing.

The third and last part of this framework is continue. These are things that they are already doing well and that you want to make sure that they keep doing. To be more clear, you want to make sure that they do these other new things that we talked about without compromising these current things that they're doing good.

Now, if this doesn't make sense yet, it'll make more sense in a minute. But the beauty of this exercise is that it's peer to peer, meaning that your team members give feedback about each other's behaviors and each other's contributions. But this isn't about a self assessment. It's about how your actions are perceived by the people around you.

The beauty of this exercise is that it creates a safe space for open, constructive dialogue that allows people to give and receive feedback in a positive and actionable way.

Why This Works

Now, I know what you're thinking. Feedback from peers can sometimes be really awkward and counterproductive, right? That's the power of Stop, Start, Continue. It's structured in a way that focuses on actions, not personal criticisms. By doing this, it makes it a lot easier for the people to accept the feedback and turn it into positive change.

It also creates a safe container for people to feel comfortable with giving the other person feedback, because a lot of times we're just nervous about hurting the other person's feelings. But in a exercise like this, where we know the other person should be expecting these three types of constructive feedback, it makes us feel better about giving that constructive feedback to the other person.

Plus, it's not just about what's not working. The key part here is that you're talking about what you want them to continue doing, which highlights what people are doing well. This balanced approach makes feedback sessions more productive and less daunting for everybody.

How to Run the Exercise, Step By Step

So let's talk about how you run this exercise. The first step is set the stage. You want to start by setting the right tone with your team. You do this by explaining that the stop, start, continue exercise is about growth and improvement. The goal isn't to criticize each other, but to help one another get better.

You might introduce this to your team by saying something like this.

Hey, everybody, we're here to support each other and to make sure we're all at our best. That's one of the top goals of our team. We're going to use the stop, start, continue exercise to help us give each other the kind of feedback that can drive positive change.

When you're setting the tone with your team, it's important to emphasize that the feedback should focus on specific behaviors and actions, not personal traits. The reason for this is when you focus on specific behaviors and actions, the feedback is more specific and it's more actionable for them. Whereas if you focus on personal traits, that might not be something that they can easily change. It might not be something that they're willing to change. Or in some cases they might not, truly be capable of it because it's part of their natural personality or it's not part of their natural strength or skill sets

The next step is to decide how you want to conduct the exercise. You can do it in a group setting where everyone's giving peer feedback openly, or you can conduct it in a one on one session between team members.

If your team is used to giving and receiving open feedback, then the group setting works great, and I highly recommend going that route. But if people are new to this type of feedback, or if the group is very large, or if there's some maybe unhealthy dynamics between some people on your team, then it's probably best to start with one on one sessions to make people feel more comfortable.

From there, what you can do is work on getting your team to be more comfortable with giving this type of feedback and then gradually work towards bringing this type of feedback into a group exercise because I think it's a lot more fun and you get a lot more diverse perspectives when one person is getting feedback from five different people and you're doing that as a round robin. So everyone receives it.

It can actually be fun where people start, teasing themselves about the things that they're bad at.

I know I should be better at this, but this is a good reminder.

It becomes more lighthearted.

It depends on where your team is at. If your team is not at that point, that's fine. Start by making it one on one. It could be you as the manager doing it with a direct report. Or you could do it in a small three person group with two people on the team and you as the manager conducting this, but the goal would be to work towards your team being comfortable with giving and receiving this type of open feedback over time.

Now, before diving into the feedback, you want to make sure you give everyone a few minutes to reflect. So what I would do is take a step back at the beginning of the exercise and ask your team to write down at least one or two points from each category. That is one or two things that you want the other person to stop doing, one or two things you want the person to start doing, and one or two things that they want the other person to continue doing. Then after you do this, encourage them to focus on specific behaviors and not personal traits.

Now it's time to share. In a group setting, go around the room and have each person give feedback to their peers. I think the best way to do this is to have one person receive the feedback at a time. You can have the room, one by one go ahead doing the stop start continue feedback. So person one can go. Person two can go. Person three can go, where all that feedback is focused on the same person. Then you could take turns and have the next person go receiving the feedback from everybody.

If you're doing this in a one on one setting, the feedback is just going to be shared between two people, which makes it more personal, and it makes it more conversational.

Whichever route you go, you want to make sure that the feedback is constructive. This isn't about calling someone out, and it's not about finger pointing either. It's about helping them grow, and it's about helping them see blind spots that they aren't noticing.

Feedback Example

Let me give you a quick example of how this might look in practice. Imagine you're a manager giving feedback to a team member who's great at their job, but they need to refine their communication style. Here's how you could use the Stop, Start, Continue framework to give that person feedback.

You want to begin with stop and you could say something like this. One thing I'd like you to stop doing is sending out long emails that can sometimes be difficult and overwhelming to follow. I know your insights are valuable, but shorter, more concise messages might help everyone stay on the same page more easily and get up to speed on basically downloading your message.

Next, you would continue to start, and you could say something like this. I'd love for you to start using our project management tool more actively when assigning tasks to other people. This will help the team stay organized and ensure that nothing falls through the cracks.

After you've done that, then you want to continue with continue. You could say something like this. What I think you're doing really well is your proactive approach to solving problems. You're always two steps ahead of the problem and everyone else in the team. That's something I want you to continue doing because it really helps the team stay focused and it helps us avoid big problems before they grow.

How Your Team Will Benefit

Feedback like this is actionable and balanced, and it focuses on specific areas where your team member can improve, while also reinforcing what they're doing well. That's what makes this exercise so powerful, that is the Stop, Start, Continue exercise. You're not just info dumping them with all the things they're doing wrong, or giving them an overwhelming amount of information that they need to start doing and learning and doing differently. You're saying, Hey, you do this well so I want to make sure you continue doing this. And I want to make sure you start doing these new things and stop doing these new things without compromising the things you're doing well. That's a totally different message than saying, Hey, you're not doing well and you need to do this better.

Another quick thing I want to share on this is what makes this exercise so great is that it's so simple. As long as you deliver this to your team and set expectations the right way, it's a real safe environment for people to feel comfortable with telling things that they otherwise wouldn't be comfortable with telling their team.

It makes everyone feel comfortable with receiving this feedback. I can tell you, like I've ran this exercise as a manager and, the first round was a little awkward and clunky, but then we would run this type of exercise quarterly. Then the second time. It was a lot easier where people knew what to do. They got up to speed and they were actually paying attention with a stop, start, continue mindset when they were working alongside their coworkers.

It became habitual and it got to a point after a year of doing this quarterly where people actually felt comfortable with giving this type of feedback on the spot. They'd be working on a project together and then someone would candidly say, Hey, I think this would be a good thing for you to stop doing. Or I think this would be something that you should start doing, on the fly. Because we put that type of framework in place with the team and built this kind of into the mindset and the character of our team, where feedback and giving and receiving constructive feedback became something that was really important to everyone on the team. It changed the culture where people weren't afraid to give this type of open feedback.

Turning Feedback Into Action

Now, the feedback is only useful if it leads to actionable and positive changes. So once the feedback has been shared, the next step is to create an action plan.

So take a step back and you can work with the other person on this and think, what are the concrete steps that person can take to stop the unproductive behaviors? What are the actionable steps they can take to start building new habits? What are the actionable steps they can do to continue doing what's working well for them?

After you guys have figured out this game plan, make sure to follow up in future meetings to see how things are progressing. This helps create accountability in them and it shows that the feedback process isn't just a one time event. It's actually part of an ongoing improvement cycle. This is how you get that habit change going and it's how you get that culture change going in your team too.

So that's the stop, start, continue exercise in a nutshell. It's a fantastic way to build trust, encourage open communication, and create a culture where feedback is seen as an opportunity for growth, not criticism. Now, whether you use it in team meetings or one on one sessions, it's simple yet powerful, and it's going to help your team grow.

If you found this video helpful and you want to learn more about how to motivate your team, make sure to check out my next episode called The Science Behind Motivating People In The Workplace. I'll be diving into what really drives people to perform at their best and what makes them tick, and more importantly, how you can tap into that as a leader. You don't want to miss this episode. Thanks for watching.

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