I noticed a very odd aspect of my own personality last week. I went out of my way to seek some feedback from one of the Podcast Sisters for my podcast. Krishna De very generously listened on one of my podcasts, and sent me back an audio critique. I saw it come into my inbox, and I froze. I realised that although I really wanted to improve, I was actually afraid of negative criticism. It took me some time to summon up the courage to get over the fear and listen to Krishna’s feedback. As it was, the feedback was so incredibly constructive that I had nothing to be afraid of but I lost precious hours fighting my own insecurity.
As sheepish as I felt after I had heard the feedback, I know for a fact that I am not the only person in the world who doesn’t like criticism. In fact, I am sure no-one really likes it. Unfortunately, many people haven’t got the ability, desire or forethought to give feedback as constructive and useful as Krishna, especially if they are a customer who is angry or upset with your company.
Dave Taylor covered the issue of how to deal with negative feedback in his post over at Daily Camera which made me think about my own reaction last week. The implication in the two interviews he documents is that although it might be easy to act on the emotional reaction (which generally results in anger, flaming, defensiveness, argument or rudeness), the only way you can successfully deal with negative criticism is to take the high ground, listen and decide what to do (if anything) in an adult manner which is going to ensure you maintain a good reputation in the eyes of everyone listening, and should serve to help the person with the grievance.
The internet provides a level of anonymity that encourages emotional people to be far more negative than they would be in person. I am sure the level of rudeness you sometimes see in forums, blog comments or blog posts would be toned down significantly were the aggrieved person actually having a face to face conversation with the offending party. One can forget that your online words are read by real human beings who have the same kind of emotions and insecurities as everyone else. They aren’t just floating into cyberspace to be processed by a computer and forgotten.
Nevertheless, at some stage we are all going to experience negative criticism. If it is delivered in the course of our business, there are only a few choices in how to deal with it. All of them should be separate from emotion, and with the reputation of yourself, your company and the reality of the grievance in mind. If the grievance is genuine, your response will be exactly what the complainant wants. If the grievance is malicious or false, it prevents you from lowering yourself to their level and helps you decide exactly how to deal with it in the most effective manner. Either way, your actions will benefit your company and ultimately your reputation within it.
I am not suggesting that it is easy – we humans are driven by emotion whether we like it or not. But it is vitally important to try. The more you try, the easier it will become to face the inevitable negative feedback, and the easier it will be to turn that to your benefit, rather than seeing it as an unpleasant thing which you need to hide from.
If you do want to hear more about this topic, this week The Podcast Sisters did a whole episode on Handling Negative Feedback on Your Blog or Podcast which I would recommend listening to.
Thanks to Stitch for the image
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