One of the key aspects of growth and change is feedback, but receiving feedback is often one of the hardest things to do.

Harvard law professor and seasoned negotiator Sheila Heen shares helpful advice from her book Thanks for the Feedback.  We learn the importance of receiving feedback and why many people respond to it so differently.

Why is it so hard for some people to receive feedback?

Sheila helps us understand this by breaking it down into the 3 triggered reactions to receiving feedback.

Truth triggers

“Truth triggers are all about the feedback itself.  ‘Is it right or is it wrong? Would it work? Is it good advice? Does it really understand the situation that we’re in?’  So it’s all about assessing the quality of the substance of the feedback.”

Relationship triggers

“Relationship triggers are actually about who is giving you the feedback. Feedback always comes wrapped in the relationship with in which it’s given. Often we will have a bigger reaction to the who than we do to the what. This is why your best friend can tell you things that nobody else can, but it’s also why sometimes we will reject feedback from a spouse.”

Identity triggers

“Identity triggers have to do with the story we tell about who we are in the world, and also our particular wiring, our sensitivity to feedback. One of the most interesting things for me was learning that individual sensitivity to feedback can vary up to 3,000 %. It really helps me understand why you have to hit some people over the head to even get their attention, while others are devastated by what seem to other people to be very small pieces of feedback.”

Our triggered reactions may vary from person to person and we may experience certain elements of all of them, depending on the feedback.

Sheila explains that we have a tendency to be good at ‘wrong-spotting’ as we are receiving feedback from others.

“As human beings I think we’re really, incredibly good at wrong-spotting. So when feedback is incoming we’re scanning for what’s wrong with it. So I’m looking for, ‘What they’re saying isn’t true? Who gave it to me? Why they gave it to me?…etc.’ If we can figure out what’s wrong with it, well then I can safely set it aside and relax and go on with my life – ego intact.”

Receiving feedback is extremely beneficial for us as individuals in order to learn and grow, and it doesn’t have to cause unnecessary stress in our lives anymore.

“We’re really good at wrong spotting and actually dismissing feedback pretty quickly. Or in the dark of night, lying awake worrying that maybe it’s all true about us. We’re not very good at sorting through to deeply understand the feedback and decide what is useful to us, then letting go of the rest of it.”

Highlight: 3 triggered reactions to feedback

The benefit of receiving feedback