The feedback culture leaders actually build — versus the one they talk about.

I have lost count of the leadership offsites where 'build a culture of feedback' landed on the strategy slide. I have also lost count of the same companies where, two quarters later, the only feedback anyone could remember receiving was on a form.

Why the gap exists

Feedback culture is not a value. It is a set of small behaviors, repeated by senior people, in public, until everyone else believes the behavior is safe to copy. Without that modeling, every initiative collapses into a survey. Edmondson's research on psychological safety makes the mechanism explicit: people calibrate what's safe to say based on what they observe leaders tolerate, not what those leaders write down.

What senior leaders actually have to do

• Ask for feedback in the room, by name, on something specific you just did.
• Receive it without defending — even when you disagree. Especially when you disagree.
• Name what you'll change, in writing, within a week. Then change it.
• Acknowledge in public when someone's feedback shifted your thinking.

“Your team will give you the feedback they believe you can hear. To get harder feedback, prove you can hear it.”

The micro-habit that scales

End every 1:1 with a single question: 'What's one thing I could do differently to make your week easier?' Asked weekly, by every manager, that one question rebuilds a feedback culture faster than any program your HR team can launch.