Have you ever had to give tough feedback to a teammate? How did you manage the situation?

Situation:
One of my junior developers was consistently submitting incomplete pull requests, which was slowing down reviews and causing merge conflicts.

Task:
As the team lead, I needed to address it without discouraging them.

Action:
I scheduled a one-on-one meeting and started by acknowledging their hard work. Then, I explained how incomplete submissions were impacting the team and provided clear examples. Together, we set up a PR checklist and weekly syncs for guidance.

Result:
Their performance improved significantly, PR rework reduced by 50%, and they later thanked me for the constructive feedback. This experience reinforced that feedback works best when it’s empathetic, specific, and solution-oriented.