The Back Brief (#24)
I’ve talked a lot about communications over the last several months because it is so challenging for leaders, especially during a crisis. One military tool that is worthwhile to add to your leadership toolkit is the back brief. Quite simply, the back brief (or brief back or backbrief) begins when the leader says the task, pitches the plan, or gives instructions to a person or the team. Then, the people or person receiving the task, plan, or instructions gives a summary of the instructions back to the leader. This gives the leader the opportunity to determine if the task, plan, or instructions were received properly. In short, in a back brief you say it as a leader. Then the team says it back to you in their own words.
In Afghanistan, the back brief technique was used every time after an operations order was presented to a team. If we did a combined mission with the Afghan police and the Afghan Army, we had to do the back brief in three languages — Pashto for the police, Dari for the army, and English for the US soldiers. Talk about a lot of opportunities to not understand the plan!
The back brief concept
Some advantages of using the back brief:
The leader and the team hears the plan twice.
Everyone walks away with a similar understanding of the plan.
The back brief eliminates the need for the team to have the “meeting after the meeting” to figure out what the boss really wants you to do.
The back brief provides an opportunity to refine the plan or correct problems with the plan.
The team pays attention more to the leader giving instructions since they know they will have to provide a summary back to the leader.
There are several ways to use a back brief:
Have each person provide a summary of their portion of the plan.
If time is short, select one person to provide a summary of the plan.
Have one person start the back brief and provide a summary of one part of the plan. Then ask another member of the team to pick up where the other stopped. Then another to do the third part.
If time is extremely short, the leader asks open questions to team members who are responsible for critical aspects of the plan.
Leaders should carefully implement the back brief, since there is the chance that your team will feel micromanaged or belittled when using it. Here are several ways to implement this technique to avoid that pitfall. The first is to model it as a leader whenever one of your team asks for you to provide assistance. For instance, when Bob asks you to call Jennifer in sales because she is late turning in the TPS report, you would use the back brief technique and say back to him “So, Bob you need me to call Jennifer over in sales to get the TPS report?” The second is to put the onus on yourself as a leader by saying “I don’t think I’m communicating that well. Would you mind saying back what I just told you?” The third is to blame me — “Hey this leadership person said to try this military tool to enhance our communications and understanding. I’m not sure it will work, but I’ll do anything to improve our communications. Could you provide a summary of what I just asked you to do?”
Using the back brief will improve your communications, decrease miscommunications, and save you and your team valuable time, especially during a crisis.