You might be right.

Listening & Communication Series: Giving & Receiving Feedback

May 30, 2023

Ever offered a little feedback and got blowback in return? Or received feedback that made you feel upset, or just like the person was in a completely different universe?

We all have had a bad experience with feedback, whether it’s been misunderstanding, hurtful words, or just not getting any until it’s too late. This guide will help you to be an awesome feedback giver and receiver. Like all skills, it’s a matter of practice and learning from our mistakes!

Receiving Feedback

Learning how to receive feedback is the first step in being good at offering effective feedback. Receiving feedback well isn’t about what’s being said and how well it’s given. It’s about being open to growth. It’s not about accepting everything someone has to say, it’s looking for the opportunities for connection and understanding.

Seek opportunities to ask for feedback and be clear about what the need is. Do you need appreciation, coaching, or to know where you stand?

Barriers to receiving feedback

First, know that feedback can activate our insecurities.

There is nothing wrong with us. We are each wonderful and complete humans. The purpose of feedback is to help us improve our skills, which take practice, and to help us know how other prefer to communicate.

We all have blind spots. Asking for people to point these out can be very valuable. The more we are open to receiving feedback, the more effective we are in every dimension of our lives and work.

What if the feedback is wrong?

Sometimes feedback will feel wrong to us for various reasons and we’ll be tempted to dismiss it or to feel angry about receiving it. We might be right! Some feedback isn’t given in good faith or accurate. So then what? In Thanks for the Feedback, Doug Stone and Sheila Heen identify three ways we discount feedback.

Three triggers:

Truth - the feedback doesn’t feel true to us

Relationship - we don’t trust the person giving the feedback in the context of what the feedback is about, or we don’t trust the person for other reasons

Identity - The feedback seems to imply something broken in ourselves rather than in something we can practice and improve

Each of these triggers can lead us to be dismissive or defensive. Often, these reactions are ‘historical’ - coming from hurt or unhealed places in ourselves from our past. They might also be reasonable, but jumping straight to dismissal usually leaves us in the dark about what was really going on.

When we notice ourselves wanting to defend ourselves or dismiss what someone says, it can be helpful to breathe, settle down, then seek clarity. Instead of just reacting, we can become good listeners and ask questions to understand what the feedback giver is actually trying to impart.

We may reject the feedback after gaining clarity, but it helps to build our relationships and our own growth to get clarity about what they meant, instead of what we assume they mean.

Getting clear

Ask the feedback giver:

What is the purpose of the feedback? Is it to appreciate something, to give advice, or to give me a sense of where I stand? (There’s an old school strategy of ‘packaging’ negative feedback within positives, the old ‘sh** sandwich’ which often leads to confusion here).
If it’s advice or coaching, are they giving suggestions or direction?
If they are evaluating, what are the consequences of the evaluation?

You don’t need to ‘believe’ the feedback in the way it’s presented, but do take the steps to understand what the person is trying to convey. Reflect back what you heard and ask for clarification. What we hear is often distorted when we feel we’re being evaluated.

Let the person know you value that they are offering feedback. One reason feedback is often unclear or distorted is that the feedback-giver is afraid of the receiver’s reaction.

The 5 Secrets Method

Dr. David Burns, one of the most important figures in modern psychology, has an approach to listening that can be very helpful in receiving feedback. These don’t work well if you’re upset or angry, so practice in less challenging situations and use them as follow-ups if you aren’t in the right space at the moment of receiving feedback.

Disarming: Find the truth in what they are saying and validate.
Appreciation: Let them know you appreciate your relationship and that they are important to you, and you are grateful to hear their feedback, even when it is challenging. Obviously, how much appreciation you give will be relative to the actual importance of the relationship to you.
“I Feel” Statements: Share the feelings that come up for you when you see things from their vantage (embarrassment, sadness, regret, etc).
Thought & Feeling Empathy: Acknowledge the feelings you heard them express or guess what those feelings might be and ask if that’s right.
Inquiry: Make sure you have given them an opportunity to fully express the feedback and that you’ve gotten what they said clearly. Ask questions like, “is there more that you want me to do differently?” or “do you feel like I am fully hearing you?” We might want to shut the person down because it can feel so uncomfortable. If you can, take notes, which provides an avenue for listening with more distance.

Traps in receiving feedback

After receiving the feedback, notice if you’re falling into any of these traps:

Feeling as though you’re unloved or unappreciated. People typically give us feedback because they believe we are capable of growth and we’re worth investing in.
Feeling defensive or worried. What other people think speaks as much about them as it does about us. Typically, if we can recognise that the feedback can be useful to us and we’re fundamentally valuable, we can make choices of how to respond that are respectful while maintaining our integrity.
Feeling angry or vengeful. When we believe someone’s feedback is unfair, we may want to retaliate, gossip, or fight. Instead, find some ways to take care of yourself until you can take a more balanced view, knowing that while often feedback isn’t “fair,” it’s true for the person who’s giving it. We always have a choice whether we want to act on the feedback.
Wrong-spotting. Looking for how the feedback isn’t fully true, and therefor there’s nothing true.

“Strong emotions can seem as if they are part of the environment rather than part of us. It’s not that I was angry, we think, it’s that the situation was tense. But situations are not tense. People are tense.”
- Douglas Stone & Sheila Heen, Thanks for the Feedback

Giving Feedback

There are all kinds of situations where we give feedback, both formal and informal. As with receiving feedback, it’s important to be clear with our own motives and goals.

Before you offer feedback:

Determine if the feedback is something that is actually helpful for the other person.
Check to make sure you’re not offering feedback to deal with your own emotions or discomfort. (Examples: Wanting to be seen as smart, wanting to be listened to, wanting the other person to behave differently because it stirs something up in us)
Avoid intermediating. Don’t prevent your feedback receiver from having the experience of dealing directly with a situation with someone else. Be willing to talk through the situation with them and encourage them to find a way to communicate, typically by being open to receiving feedback from the other person.
Be in the habit of asking for feedback. Don’t give feedback without first modeling asking for feedback, listening well, and embracing the opportunity for growth.
Consider the relationship and the context of the feedback. When someone perceives you to have power, they will naturally be more sensitive to what you say. Default to “praise in public, criticize in public.”
Notice who you feel compelled to give feedback to. One study found that Black women received 9x the amount of non-actionable feedback as white men, for example.

Three types of feedback

Many times feedback is received poorly because the feedback giver and receiver are not aligned on what the purpose of the feedback is. When someone thinks we’re evaluating them but we’re actually giving them suggestions, it can feel threatening. Similarly, appreciation feels like a weapon when it’s coming along with negative evaluation. Avoid conflating or combining different forms of feedback and make it clear what mode you’re in.

Appreciation

As Lynne Twist says, “What you appreciate appreciates.” Appreciation helps people know they are doing good work, that you recognise their effort, and that they are noticed and matter to you. Appreciation works best when it is focused on behaviour, action, and outcomes rather than on identity or personality. A culture of appreciation helps people to relax and be more confident, making it easier for them to take coaching and evaluation more effectively.

There are different ways to give appreciation and success depends somewhat on how the person best receives appreciation. Some people respond to public praise with pride while for others, it’s awkward. Some people value having good work called out in a group, while others would prefer a personal message. Some people value a ‘boss’ giving kudos while others are more motivated by a team member’s praise. It might be that the thing someone would value most is you seeking their input, or opportunities for professional development. If you’re working with someone on an ongoing basis, it can be valuable to discover what feels great to them. What is their “love language?”

Coaching

Everyone benefits from coaching. We are on a path of growth and change at all times, and great coaching helps us improve our skills, better communicate, and see our blind spots. Coaching can include very practical, ‘here’s how this works” information, to ‘here’s how I see that you might improve’, all the way up to ‘what is your career goal and how might I help you achieve it?’

Coaching will backfire if the person doesn’t understand your motivation, or if they are in a defensive stance. It’s a good practice to ask whether the person would like this coaching, so you don’t create frustration for them or for yourself. Even if you think they “need” it, if they aren’t open to it, your coaching will likely have the opposite effect to the one you hope for.

When you coach or offer advice, always do so from the perspective that the person is capable of doing whatever you’re suggesting, and most likely could figure it out by themselves given some time. Don’t make coaching about you and your expertise. If you’re giving coaching with an expectation that the person will do as you say, make that clear and communicate how you plan to evaluate their work.

Coaching can go wrong when it’s intended to change the other person because of their emotional impact on the feedback-giver. Make sure that before you offer advice, you are aligned with the goals the person has for themselves.

Evaluation

We are constantly evaluating ourselves, others, and the situations we’re in. This is critical as humans because we evolved in a context of cooperation and very slow brain development- we’re not at full prefrontal capacity until our 20s! This is also why being evaluated is so activating- we have an embodied pain sensation when we feel rejected.

Evaluations come in all kinds of forms, from little comments, to one-on-one conversations, to full-blown performance reviews (though the latter is not the most effective approach to feedback). Evaluations are useful and desirable. They help people have a sense of where they stand with another person or within a group or organization. They are helpful to gauge progress on a project or with skills-development.

Evaluations are generally comparisons, against a standard, among the performance of other people, or with our own expectations.

Evaluations can be used to create alignment (i.e. we both agree that this the goal and where we/you are at with the goal). They can be used to inform decisions. If evaluation has consequences, then they should be clear.

Good expectations are transparent, actionable, and equitable. For example, we don’t have ‘lower expectations’ for people in the same role because of who they are, their background, or their circumstances. Instead, we determine what different support each person may need to meet the expectation and don’t just assume the same support is required or sufficient. Our ultimate goal is always to support our mutual success.

This applies to evaluations coming from any direction of power. When we give feedback to people with more ‘clout’ than us, we still want to do so in a way that respects their dignity and assumes they are capable of growth and change.

If someone is not meeting an expectation, it’s unkind to withhold evaluation, even when we can think of lots of reasons why it will feel bad for the person. It’s much worse to learn they’re not meeting expectations when it’s ‘too late’ (being let go or disciplined) or they’ve got a much more uphill battle to correct the impression of failure or incompetence. When we have a story that it will be insensitive to share an evaluation, it’s often our own fragility we are protecting.

People also often skip evaluation when things are going well or ‘good enough.’ Appreciation is a great way to give positive reinforcement, but don’t assume people want to be stuck in a state of success. It’s often helpful to get an understanding of challenges or growth areas that might benefit from evaluation (from the feedback receiver’s perspective) so we can support their continued sense of mastery.

As you give feedback, ask the receiver what kind of feedback they are hearing (Appreciation, Coaching, or Evaluation) and what kind of feedback they want.

Know someone who could use some feedback tips?

Abusive feedback

People who give us feedback are not always operating in good faith or with kindness or skill. When power dynamics enter the picture, there are ways feedback can be weaponized. If someone’s personal feelings of judgement, bias, or preference are being called “feedback,” things often get messy.

As receivers, it’s usually still valuable to listen and clarify. There isn’t always a viable option to leave the situation immediately. If you are in a situation that feels abusive, the five secrets method will still often work to clarify and diffuse the situation, even though you may need to document and discuss the situation with trusted others after you’re out of the conversation.

The most important thing is receiving feedback is to recognise in ourselves that there is nothing wrong with us. Any feedback, even toxic feedback, tells us something valuable, even if its’ only information about how the person we’re interacting with prefers to communicate. Be honest and compassionate with yourself, both in listening and rejecting feedback. If a person uses feedback to enforce power over you, generally speaking it’s a good time to get out of that situation. Look to friends, external groups or advisors, or trusted colleagues for support.

Extra Credit

Here are some excellent resources around feedback and communication:

Changemaker Product Management