Radical Candor Feedback Leadership Practice Training Course

Course overview

Managers are often expected to address missed commitments, unproductive behaviour, weak collaboration and performance gaps without damaging trust. In practice, feedback is delayed, softened until it loses meaning, or delivered so bluntly that people become defensive. This course equips leaders to use the Radical Candor framework to challenge directly while demonstrating genuine personal care, making feedback a routine management practice rather than an annual-review event.

Participants learn to distinguish Radical Candor from Ruinous Empathy, Obnoxious Aggression and Manipulative Insincerity; prepare evidence-based feedback; and hold clear conversations about performance, conduct, growth and team impact. They practise asking for feedback, giving praise that reinforces valued behaviours, responding constructively to defensiveness, and following up on agreed actions. The course also covers adapting candour across seniority, personality, remote teams and culturally diverse workplaces without reducing standards or avoiding difficult messages.

Teaching combines instructor demonstration, filmed and written workplace cases, structured role-play, peer observation and coached rehearsal. Participants work with real leadership situations from their own teams, using feedback-planning templates, conversation scripts and observation checklists. They leave with a personal Radical Candor Leadership Practice Plan: a mapped set of live conversations, preparation notes, follow-up measures and a 30-day rhythm for requesting, giving and documenting feedback.

This intermediate programme is suited to people managers who already conduct one-to-ones, delegate work or contribute to performance discussions and now need a repeatable method for handling candid conversations with greater precision and accountability.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Apply the Radical Candor framework to diagnose feedback behaviours as Radical Candor, Ruinous Empathy, Obnoxious Aggression or Manipulative Insincerity
• Prepare evidence-based feedback using observable behaviour, business impact and a clear request for change
• Conduct direct performance conversations using the CARE feedback sequence and calibrated questioning
• Deliver specific praise that links individual actions to team outcomes and organisational standards
• Request upward and peer feedback using a structured solicitation script and non-defensive response techniques
• Handle emotional reactions, disagreement and defensiveness while maintaining accountability and psychological safety
• Adapt candid feedback for remote, cross-functional and culturally diverse working relationships
• Produce a 30-day Radical Candor Leadership Practice Plan with priority conversations, follow-up actions and success measures

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• Line Managers — who must address performance, behaviour and delivery issues in regular one-to-ones
• Team Leaders — who need to build a feedback culture while balancing operational accountability
• Department Heads — who set expectations for management quality and cross-team collaboration
• Project Managers — who must challenge contributors and stakeholders without formal line authority
• HR Business Partners — who coach managers through sensitive employee-performance conversations
• Newly Promoted Managers — who need a practical structure for moving from peer relationships to leadership conversations

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have at least six months of experience leading people, projects or workstreams and should be familiar with routine one-to-ones, goal setting and basic performance expectations. They should be prepared to bring two anonymised, current feedback situations for practice, such as missed deadlines, recurring behaviour or development needs. No prior study of Radical Candor, coaching certification, HR qualification or formal performance-management system expertise is required. Participants do not need specialist software; access to their normal video-conferencing and document tools is sufficient for live-online delivery.

Training methodology

The programme is delivered through short instructor-led briefings followed by repeated feedback practice. Participants analyse cases using the Radical Candor quadrants, convert vague concerns into observable evidence and rehearse conversations in manager, employee and observer roles. Peers use structured observation checklists to assess care, directness, specificity and action-setting. Facilitators coach language choices in the moment, including responses to silence, disagreement and emotion. Each day ends with application planning, culminating in a prioritised 30-day feedback practice plan built around participants’ live workplace situations.

Course outline

Day 1: Diagnosing feedback culture and leadership habits

• The Radical Candor model: Care Personally and Challenge Directly
• The four feedback quadrants and their workplace consequences
• Ruinous Empathy patterns in performance management
• Obnoxious Aggression and the cost of unmanaged bluntness
• Manipulative Insincerity in political or low-trust teams
• Feedback triggers, avoidance habits and manager self-awareness
• Separating intent, observable behaviour and perceived impact

Workshop: Participants diagnose six workplace feedback cases against the four quadrants and produce a personal candour-pattern assessment.

Day 2: Preparing and delivering clear feedback

• Fact gathering: observations, examples, dates and work outputs
• The CARE sequence for feedback conversation preparation
• Framing behaviour-impact feedback without labels or assumptions
• Making a direct, proportionate request for change
• Choosing timing, setting and channel for sensitive conversations
• Using calibrated questions to test understanding and ownership
• Closing conversations with actions, dates and review points

Workshop: Participants prepare and role-play a live corrective-feedback conversation, producing a completed CARE conversation plan and follow-up note.

Day 3: Praise, growth and two-way feedback

• Specific praise that reinforces standards and repeatable behaviours
• Distinguishing recognition from developmental feedback
• Career-growth conversations using strengths, motivations and aspirations
• Soliciting feedback from direct reports and peers
• The More, Less, Start and Stop feedback prompts
• Receiving criticism without rebuttal, justification or withdrawal
• Turning feedback themes into individual development actions

Workshop: Participants run a feedback-solicitation clinic and produce a personal More, Less, Start and Stop request script with response commitments.

Day 4: Handling difficult reactions and complex contexts

• Recognising defensiveness, shutdown, anger and emotional escalation
• Acknowledging emotion without retreating from the message
• De-escalation language and purposeful pauses
• Managing disagreement over facts, impact or fairness
• Feedback across power differences and senior stakeholders
• Remote feedback conversations in Microsoft Teams and Zoom
• Cultural context, directness preferences and consistent standards

Workshop: Participants complete a rotating difficult-conversation simulation and produce a response map for defensiveness, denial and emotional escalation.

Day 5: Embedding Radical Candor in team practice

• Designing feedback rhythms for one-to-ones and team meetings
• Setting team agreements for challenge, praise and repair
• Using feedback logs and action trackers responsibly
• Coaching managers and peers to improve feedback quality
• Linking candid conversations to goals, performance reviews and development plans
• Measuring feedback practice through pulse questions and follow-up evidence
• Building a 30-day Radical Candor Leadership Practice Plan

Workshop: Participants present a 30-day implementation plan and produce a feedback cadence, priority-conversation list, measures and accountability partner agreement.

Tools & standards covered

Radical Candor framework, Miro, Microsoft Teams, Zoom

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions