Getting the Most Out of Feedback

I recently learned from a friend that her former boss never met with her one on one or gave her feedback on her work (even when she expressly asked for it) for the entire year or so that he managed her. At first I laughed and said “Lucky you!” — but I joke. It’s difficult to improve upon your work or know that you’re being effective — if you never get feedback and figure out how to act upon it.?

It took me awhile to see feedback as more of a blessing than a curse. In my early years out of school, every little criticism of my work or edit to my copy stung like a critique of my very soul. I was the stereotypical oldest daughter/achiever/anxious student and hadn’t been given a lot of critical feedback at that point. I took feedback so personally that I?still?remember feeling indignant about some of my editor’s comments on stories from my internship at my hometown paper in the early 90s.?

But good feedback like hers helped me improve my writing, and with experience, I grew a thicker skin and became pretty darn good at learning from feedback. Here are a few tips for how to do that:?

1. Understand the feedback and make a plan.?Is it about an error you make repeatedly? Teach yourself to stop making it. Put a post-it on your laptop screen as a reminder. Is it about your interactions with colleagues? Learn about what a good interaction looks like and then practice it. Ask follow-up questions. You have to first understand what you’re being asked to change (and why) to determine your best way forward.?
2. Don’t grow TOO thick of a skin.?Remembering the sting of certain past comments will remind you to be empathetic when?you?have to give someone difficult feedback. Sometimes people have good excuses for making mistakes; sometimes they still haven't learned a skill yet. Everyone deserves respect even when receiving a hard critique, so be kind. (Also, let's acknowledge that sometimes people’s feedback is?not?very respectful or coming from a place of helpfulness; workplace saboteurs and jerks exist, and I’ll address them in a future newsletter.??)?
3. Develop a growth mindset.?I also hadn’t yet learned to have a growth mindset about things that didn’t come naturally to me, so when given negative feedback I’d shrug and think, “That’s just not my thing,” and try to NEVER DO THAT THING AGAIN. (Looking at you, statistics.) A growth mindset helps in the short term – it gives you the power of yet (you have not learned or mastered something YET). It really helps in the long term because you’ll get good at tackling the “hard stuff” early on. (Want to learn more about developing a growth mindset? Read?Mindset?by Carol Dweck or?watch her Ted talk.)

A little bonus advice??If you do things well and efficiently, you’ll go a long way to receiving feedback that is more helpful and focused on the work you complete. People appreciate good work done by or before deadline, and it gives them the opportunity to give feedback that’s completely relevant without being distracted by little errors or lateness. If you’re prone to diving into the picky details of a task without understanding the larger thing that needs to be done, you’ll agonize over minutia, potentially miss the point of the deliverable and/or finish late. You might be thinking your perfectionism is helpful, but it isn't. Instead, it gives you more opportunity to second-guess yourself and fall behind.