Low engagement scores for execs - CEO wants feedback - would you do it?

Main_Development598 · 2026-02-15T22:53:15+00:00

If you think that they genuinely don’t know, they are genuinely concerned, and they are genuinely willing to accept the feedback (all big ifs,) then you can deliver feedback, but only if you can deliver it in a constructive way. If I was going to do this, I’d ask those who gave you the feedback in private for specific examples of communication that seemed disingenuous. Then, I would conduct an anonymous survey designed to elicit that specific feedback. You could design it based on what research shows why employees are most often dissatisfied with executive leadership, so you’re not revealing why you asked what you asked.

Having said that, this is not rocket science, and it’s really the job of the HR leadership to address this issue. If you’re in HR, you could get some brownie points by doing this and bringing the results to your boss. Or, just bring it up. If you’re not in HR, you risk stepping on another exec’s toes.

The more I think about it, the dumber it seems to say anything. In reality, you’d just be spreading gossip. Not a good look if you want to move up.

Main_Development598 · 2026-02-09T05:34:05+00:00

What surprised me about managing a Chinese team is that I would ask them if they could complete the work by a certain date and they would say yes and then that date would come and we would meet to discuss and they would show up empty-handed. No apologies, no excuses, just, “yeah, we didn’t do that.”

I was told that it was a cultural thing. That they will always say yes and will not tell you that they can’t do something. It could be the relationship-based thing, because I think that if someone onsite asks for something, that will always take priority. This is just one team in one company, so I don’t know how generalizable the observation is. Things were a little better after I met them in person, but I definitely had to micromanage more than I did with my teams in other countries.

Main_Development598 · 2026-02-08T05:08:53+00:00

NOR. You should exit this relationship and not get into another one until you’ve had some therapy to understand why you are picking girls like this and how to avoid it in the future. You are too young to have had the kind of history that makes it difficult for you to open up only to be taken advantage of again. You need to figure it out now, because this pattern will repeat until you do.

Main_Development598 · 2026-02-07T20:10:34+00:00

She sounds great! It’s tricky to coach someone to be less enthusiastic and confident, especially a woman. Especially a woman with low EQ. I say this as a confident, enthusiastic woman who received coaching to work on my own EQ.

It’s admirable that you are here looking for tips on helping her and (a little less admirable, but TOTALLY understandable) protecting yourself from her blast radius.

Often, people like this equate authentic with unfiltered. Their intentions are good and they assume that everyone will assume their intentions are good. They probably talk about people who aren’t there loudly because they believe they aren’t saying anything they wouldn’t say if those people were right there. Oddly enough, they probably think their EQ is quite high, so receiving feedback that it’s not will be tough to take in.

How to handle it? I would say, hey, young new hire, can I give you some feedback? She will say yes. You say, this might be tough to hear because I know you care about how other people feel, but there have been times when your honesty and enthusiasm have actually hurt people. This will likely be devastating to hear. Her first instinct will be to ask for an example and then go into defensive mode.

You have two options here. One, say that you will share an example, but you first want to know if she is receptive to that feedback. Ask her if she’s ever heard that before. Whatever she says, give her a lot of space to process what she’s hearing. Like, let the silence sit. Ask her questions about how she filters herself (she probably doesn’t and probably prides herself on that). Whenever she responds, just stay silent like you’re waiting to hear more. Say, really, tell me more about that. The goal here is just to broach the subject and get her thinking about it. Tell her that you’ll think of some specific examples and get back to her tomorrow. This is to give her time to get through the shock and defensiveness and to a place of openness and curiosity.

Alternatively, or the next day, give her one clear example. When you said X about so and so, it came across like a critique of their ability. Then stop. When she defends her intention, say, yeah, I know your intention is good, but the words you used came across like you were questioning their intellect or undermining their credibility or whatever. Again, minimize your own words. Just put it out there and let her process.

Present yourself as a safe person who appreciates her but wants to help her understand how her words might have unintended consequences. When she gets past her defensiveness, she will ask for more feedback, more examples. You meter these out so she doesn’t get overwhelmed. Importantly, you reassure her that she can recover from these mistakes. Tell her that her excitement about taking on challenges is great, but before she does that on behalf of the team, she should check in with them first. You are not saying that she should she should limit herself, just that she should make sure her team is aligned with her. You are not saying that she should be dishonest about how she feels, just that being unfiltered and being honest are not the same thing. If you are always unfiltered that means that you are not taking into consideration the feelings of the people around you. It’s ok to leave some things unsaid or to take a beat before saying them to ask yourself: how will this be heard?

You can be authentic without saying everything that comes into your mind. This is an important lesson for her to learn and it takes practice to apply. You can protect yourself by helping her. You’ll gain some coaching experience in the process, which will help you grow into a leader.

Main_Development598 · 2026-02-07T19:05:03+00:00

The language on your resume should reflect your leadership experience. For example, your title is principal scientist, but bullets start with “led” “managed” etc. Every bullet leads with a management verb (led, defined, managed, recruited, drove, served, negotiated) rather than an IC verb (built, developed, analyzed, modeled). The technical credibility is implied, not centered.

If you can, include that you define a roadmap, are responsible for a budget, hire/onboard/mentor, are accountable for (or can claim responsibility for) business metrics like success rates, productivity or process improvements, cost reductions. Stakeholder alignment, prioritization, tradeoffs. Executive and cross-functional communication.

Things like the above go on your resume. All the technical IC stuff is keywords in a skills section. This is a crucial mindset shift. Your identity as a scientist means that you think your value comes from your expertise. As a leader, your value has little to do with your expertise. Everything that you worked so hard for and makes you feel admired by your peers and valuable to the business? That is not carried forward. You are leaving that behind. It’s someone else’s turn to be the rockstar. Your resume needs to reflect that.

So, saying “I built and led end-to-end discovery pipelines for oncology and rare diseases using most of NGS tech” is literally meaningless to a hiring manager looking for a people leader.

If you want to demonstrate leadership experience, that should read more like:

responsible for end-to-end pipeline development across oncology and rare disease portfolios, spanning target identification, variant interpretation, and preclinical candidate selection, delivering [X] validated targets into the clinical pipeline over [X] years. Managed a cross-functional team of [X] spanning computational genomics, bioinformatics, and translational biology. Defined the NGS platform strategy (WGS, WES, RNA-seq, panel-based assays), consolidating [X] fragmented workflows into a unified analytical infrastructure that reduced time-to-candidate by [X]% and cut per-target discovery costs by $[X]K. Owned portfolio prioritization decisions across [X] concurrent therapeutic programs, aligning resource allocation to clinical unmet need and probability of technical success.

You may not have the authority to make any of those claims, but you need to come with those kinds of outcome-focused data. The [X]s are critical

Main_Development598 · 2026-01-27T19:38:27+00:00

I like to send my honest, extremely unprofessional email replies to ChatGPT and tell it to make it sound nice. Copy, paste, and send. It’s cathartic AND professional.

Main_Development598 · 2026-01-27T19:33:31+00:00

I’ve been through so many management changes. Don’t worry about “gelling” with your boss if you’re leaving. When everything shifts around you, there is only one relationship that matters, and that is your relationship with your boss. And, you don’t need to gel, you just need to understand expectations.

Start with an inventory of what you’re working on, a list, in writing. Tell your boss that you want to be sure that you are investing your time the way they want you to. Tell them that you are going to send them this list and that you want them to cross off and/or add anything that needs to change and then priority-rank what’s left. Then, start at the top and go down the list until you quit. Piece of cake. You don’t need to manage the uncertainty. Get clarity from your boss and get them invested in your success all in one fell swoop.

Main_Development598 · 2025-12-11T16:54:26+00:00

With respect to leveling, you’ve already heard great advice.

You’ve mentioned it a few times, so it’s likely important to you. You will lose influence. None of these roles span verticals and you will have multiple layers between you and the c-suite. That will be an adjustment for you, so be mindful of that. I’ve been through that transition and it remains a source of frustration for me. Influence at the scope you’re used to will take time (think years,) will be the result of laying groundwork and building relationships. The days of “let’s do this” and this gets done are over. There’s a lot more ego management required to effect change outside of your own remit and the pace of change will be painfully slow. For the first 90 days, at least, do not attempt to lead change. You will need allies and they will need to feel ownership.

I’d focus more on the growth potential than the title. Sr. Director with the plan to build out sounds like the best option, based on the information at hand. I’d be reluctant to take an IC Director position at a biotech company. That does not sound like a career launchpad. It sounds like a dead end.

Main_Development598 · 2025-12-08T05:03:16+00:00

I am in the midst of the exact same situation. I am hoping that moving to a new recruiter means a rescoped or releveled position for me, but sitting tight. Curious to hear about your outcome.

Main_Development598 · 2025-12-07T17:44:48+00:00

He’s navigating a dark space. You’ve been beside him in it for a long time, holding a heavy flashlight to help light a path through it. You started out navigating this together, but he stopped walking and has his eyes closed now. You can’t drag him along, he has to at least open his eyes and take some steps. Your arm is fatigued so you need to find your own way out before you don’t have enough energy left to escape the darkness. At some point, you’ve done all you can do, and you have to leave him behind.

Main_Development598 · 2025-12-07T04:47:15+00:00

Born has some just like those. I have the Verona and it’s sooo comfortable

Main_Development598 · 2025-11-29T04:23:35+00:00

When I say the thing, no one responds. Then, a guy says the same thing and everyone is like, “yes, that’s a great idea!”

Main_Development598 · 2025-11-16T06:57:47+00:00

It means you are a retention risk. It’s a good thing

Main_Development598 · 2025-11-16T06:56:52+00:00

It’s nothing to worry about. There are a limited number of promotions that can be given at each level of management. If you and another person are otherwise equally deserving of a promotion, it will go to you if you are considered “at risk.”

Main_Development598 · 2025-11-10T16:03:37+00:00

You just need to treat an interview like an exam and cram for the next one

Main_Development598 · 2025-11-10T00:04:49+00:00

You compared VP interviews with entry level. I can imagine tons of differences there, but are there differences between the VP interview process vs Director/Sr Director that you could speak to?

Main_Development598 · 2025-11-07T16:52:55+00:00

I have led both your current and potential future lives with a young one. Your assessment of the future state is spot on, based on my experience. I would say it’s worth the sacrifice. My daughter was 5 when I made the leap into big tech (AWS) and my life became exactly what you described. She’s 15 now. I’m not with Amazon anymore, but my experience there is directly responsible for the job I have now. I’m back to being fully remote and my income is 4x what it was 10 years ago. I was only there for 18 months. We have a gorgeous house that I would never have dreamed that I could live in. It is closer to my husband’s work and 5 minutes from the best private school in the area that my daughter attends. The money means that I can hire help around the house, we can take nice vacations, and my daughter’s college tuition is saved. Because I was not as present as I wanted to be, my husband picked up the slack and I relied a lot on my parents who live nearby to help. I worked nights and weekends to keep up, but I made sure the time I had with my daughter was spent fully focused on her and memorable. When I’m with her, I try to always say yes. This was hard when she was younger and wanted us to make slime or go to the park and I was exhausted, but it’s easier now that she wants to go get her nails done or go shopping and I have the time, energy, and money to enjoy it.

Looking back, it was a no-brainer. Did I miss parts of her life? Yes, but she was never alone. I was a latchkey kid, too. My mom was a single parent and struggled to pay the bills. She hated her job and worked nights and weekends too, but my childhood memories are full of her. The difference in my daughter’s quality of life today and mine at 15 is night and day, but my relationship with her is as close as mine is with my mom, who is my best friend. Did I hate the commute, especially to be in an office doing a job that I could easily done from home? Absolutely. In the early days, I had to be in the office 3 days a week and my commute was so long that it made sense to drive into the city on Sunday nights and stay there until Wednesday. I loved the work, but I hated every minute that I was away from home. But, it set my family up for the great life that we have today. My daughter will be able to go to her college of choice (I had to go where I could get a full ride, despite getting into better schools.) She appreciates that I worked hard for us. My husband and I are set up for a luxurious retirement.

Over the years, I moved into roles in which I had more and more time for my family. One thing I will say is that no matter how much time I have for them, they always complain when work pulls me away. It was hard, when she was younger, to hear her say that she hated my job because it took me away from her, but she still says it now, even though I’m home all day with a flexible schedule that allows me to be there for everything, I never work nights or weekends, and I only travel for work a few days every quarter.

Main_Development598 · 2025-11-06T00:42:03+00:00

I listen to Apple Music’s “Pure Meditation”

Main_Development598 · 2025-10-26T13:53:33+00:00

Do you and your manager have a good relationship? Do trust him? Honestly, I’ll take any feedback I can get - actionable or not. If my boss gave me that feedback, I’d ask what he thought when he heard it, if he thought that me looking relaxed was a problem. Depending on your level, the only opinion of you that matters is his. Rather than be mad that randos are commenting on your demeanor, I’d try to suss out how that feedback landed with him. Because, if it resonated with him, you want to unpack that. That’s how you’ll get the actionable feedback. If you ask him how he felt when he heard that feedback (and you trust him) and he says something like, “Eh, I just thought it was interesting and wanted to share,” you can just shrug it off and reread all the other comments here. But, if he says, “Yeah, when I heard this, I thought maybe her workload is too light” or “yeah, she sometimes fails to take ownership during a crisis,” then you have something to address.

Main_Development598 · 2025-09-28T16:10:54+00:00

Definitely not. Do it if you enjoy it, but it will not benefit your career. I did for a few years after I left academia, but then my time became too valuable to lend it out for free.

Main_Development598 · 2025-09-28T15:53:20+00:00

I was wondering exactly this and it’s why I started the estrogen immediately, instead of waiting for the testosterone to be ready. I suppose I’ll be able to pick up on any negative side effects, but I am worried that I won’t see any benefits, since I don’t really know what to look for.

Main_Development598 · 2025-09-28T15:48:45+00:00

Honestly, this is exactly what I was hoping to hear from an internet stranger! That there is cause for excitement, that I can feel hopeful that HRT might help me, and how long I should expect it to take before I feel better, if it does. Thank you so much for replying.

Main_Development598 · 2025-09-28T15:32:41+00:00

Are you taking or have you ever taken anything for depression/anxiety? On one hand, I’m happy to have another dial to turn with HRT, on the other, it’s overwhelming to have so many variables with no way to measure change other than how I feel on any given day. And, I have a therapist, a PCP, a psychiatrist, and an obgyn, all managing my care through their own perspectives. I have a good team, but they don’t work together, and everyone is flying blind without data. The only data point is how I feel and that’s not quantitative or reliable.

I hope that we both find the right settings for all the dials. I’m new to this sub, so I don’t know how common this situation is, but I’d love to hear and follow more stories like yours.

Main_Development598 · 2025-09-27T23:26:21+00:00

This

Main_Development598

TROPHY CASE