There’s No Such Thing as Negative Feedback
Business May 28th, 2008What is something that most employees are just dying to get more of? Name something that most couples could use to open up lines of communication. What seems to be a lot more comfortable in close friendships and highly valued yet feared from strangers. Its a top reason listed for an employee to quit a job, yet its often the cause of anger and resentment in the workplace when taken the wrong way. What am I talking about? Feedback.  That’s right, feedback.
The Problem With Feedback
There is certainly a lot of discussion and articles about feedback and while many of them have great tips and ideas on how to use and give feedback, they still focus on two sides of feedback, positive and negative. Some people call it constructive and appreciative, others call it adjusting and reinforcing. To me, it doesn’t really matter what you want to call it, feedback is simple feedback. There is no such thing as positive or negative feedback because what you get from feedback is up to you. How you interpret it is what steers it to be positive or negative, so the feedback itself can’t be negative. I wrote recently another article about choosing your own response to things and this certainly includes feedback. Any useful and good intentioned feedback should include specifics of what you did and what that action caused or the impact of that action. The important points there are that feedback is action based instead of some interpretive or emotional comment or assumption and that there is a point in the feedback about what the impact or result was or at least perceived as.
What Can You Do With Feedback
Now, my point here is that there is really nothing negative about proper feedback. There is no way to say it is positive or negative, it is simply fact. For example, http://www.parkbluesky.com/ is a great website. The rest is interpretive and different for each person. So, if people would realize that feedback is given to help, and you can use it to make a difference only in the future and that you can’t change what has already occurred, then ALL feedback is useful feedback. Take some time to think about how you give feedback and how you receive it. Do you take it for what it is and look for how it can help you? How do you respond to the person giving feedback? I’ll suggest learning to just say two words, “Thank you” and leave it at that. Don’t deny it, disagree with it, change it, deflect it, reinforce it, argue it, or anything else, just say “Thank you” and reflect on it. Learn to see the value in feedback and don’t worry about how it is expressed. Look specifically for how it helps you and most importantly, don’t label it as positive or negative. Feedback is just that, feedback.
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Mike King
May 28th, 2008 at 8:41 AM
It is so true that feedback is what you make of it. However, we default towards being defensive when presented with a critique. I like the idea of saying, “Thank You.” and taking time to reflect. Perhaps it would be good to schedule a “Feedback Reflection Time” into your day, where you could take time to evaluate the feedback you have received and create action plans to address it if needed.
May 28th, 2008 at 11:39 PM
Adopted your two-words-response. I practice this after i read your “compliments..” post, and it works really good.
thanks
alikl
May 29th, 2008 at 4:26 AM
Well personally I think you can’t improve unless you are given the proper feedback. Like you say, Feedback is just feedback!
May 29th, 2008 at 6:34 AM
Chris, nice idea to spend time specifically on feedback reflection. Its definitely useful to review your day / week and see what you can gain from it.
Alik, that’s awesome to hear a simple response has made an impact for you! Feedback is very similar to getting a compliment in the response aspect.
And Komodo, I agree that feedback is essential to improve as well. I don’t believe feedback all has to come from others or be told to you though, there are also other ways to pick up on it.
May 30th, 2008 at 6:29 AM
Thanks for the insightful post.
If we consider ourselves lifelong learners, always looking for ways to take our game to the next level, then we have a better chance of interpreting “negative” feedback as useful information. (No matter how poorly communicated to us.)
If we have the need to be perceived as already competent, then information that contradicts that need feels more threatening, and we resist it.
Lifelong learning needs to be the new competence!
January 22nd, 2009 at 12:23 AM
I was listening to an older MT podcast. Mark mentioned there is no such thing as “constructive feedback”… something to ponder on but more or less similar to what you wrote as no +ve or -ve feedback. But how you give feedback (i.e. choice of words, not the method) changes the receiving person’s perception and level of acceptance.
February 7th, 2012 at 3:44 AM
If someone says they don’t like your product or service, they are being negative. You can be open and turn this to your advantage and it can be very helpful. However terms such as ‘This product sucks’ are expressions of negativity – therefore negative feedback. Perhaps the problem here is that you’re viewing yourself as the centre of the universe rather than sharing that with your customer!
February 7th, 2012 at 7:44 AM
Something, such as feedback, which inherently is already positive or negative (depending on perspective) doesn’t need to be termed negative again. The point here is that any feedback can be used to help improve something or to gain new valuable insight and that we should not focus on considering it positive or negative, its just helpful feedback. Someone saying your product sucks still has some inherent value, perhaps you are reaching the wrong audience/customers, maybe there is something that they reacted to that caused them to say that, perhaps they had a bad day and just used your product as a way to unload, no matter what the feedback, there is always something in it you can learn from without dwelling on it and taking it personally in a destructive way. Feedback can be both, even at the same feedback, so use it constructively and learn from it, either way.