How Do You Know When Feedback Isn't Really Feedback?
Photo credit: Pine Watt via Unsplash
How to tell when feedback actually is a “wolf in sheep’s clothing.”
Feedback is not always feedback. Sometimes what arrives wearing that name is something else entirely, an old grievance let loose, a public correction that has nothing to do with growth. Learning to tell the difference matters more than most of us realize, and it starts with a simple question: Does this leave you clearer, or does it leave you smaller?
We asked our writing group to think about the worst feedback they had ever received. What made it hard to hear? What would feedback that helped them grow have looked like instead?
Three stories point to a particular kind of feedback failure, one where the message stops being about growth and becomes something else, an ambush dressed up as insight. Harvard researcher Amy Edmondson's foundational work on psychological safety offers a useful lens here: whether people can take in hard information honestly has less to do with how tough they are and more to do with whether the environment around them feels safe enough to hold it. None of these three stories fails because the feedback itself was too hard to hear. They fail because the room wasn't safe enough to hold it.
Each story also raises a question about discernment. What do we take in? What do we question? What do we let go and disregard? And how do we know when what is being called feedback is not actually feedback at all?
A Performance Review with a Surprise
The worst feedback I have ever received still resonates in my gut. I remember the situation more than the feedback itself.
Two things made it unhelpful. One was that it was a surprise during a performance review. I had not received any request to change anything that I was doing before that moment. Also, it wasn’t just my manager who was present. It was her manager as well. Her presence was a surprise. I took a deep breath.
Next, the feedback wasn’t balanced or accurate. There was information that was not true. There were no references to anything I had actually accomplished or done. I felt cornered. I felt I had no agency and no clear action I could take. Lastly, no one in the room was my advocate. My manager and her boss were good friends, and I did not have a good relationship with either of them.
What could have made this better? One, I could have deliberately invited feedback earlier. I say that because I don’t think I would’ve gotten any feedback otherwise. Better conversations before the review would have helped, with clear requests for improvement and some sign that my boss cared enough to believe that I could change. Less anger in the room would have helped, too.
It was as though my boss took these things personally, and it was clearly not about me. I told myself that it was actually time to leave, and that’s what set me on the path to helping others. And I also told myself that none of this goes to waste, and it has not. — Janet Hepler Williams
When a Question Could Have Changed Everything
Relatively new at a well-established church and serving as the administrator, I was tasked with helping celebrate the church’s 150th anniversary. Established in Dallas in 1845, the church had families whose names inspired downtown Dallas streets. A woodworking member agreed to create display cases to showcase historical documents and pictures.
These half-dozen cases remained in the main hallway months after the celebration. Since churches serving as museums can create some issues for growth, I was later asked to have them removed and the contents stored.
One woman, with whom I had already had a run-in, confronted me on a Sunday morning when she got word that I had ordered the materials moved. Without asking a question, and in front of several people, she said to me, “I can’t believe you removed our church’s history without so much as a blink. You little Nazi. You think you can run the show here. I have news for you. I’m gonna have you fired, mark my words.”
If anyone ever thought this to be rare in church, it is not.
By calling me a little Nazi, she was half right. I am small of stature, but swastika-wearing I am not. She had many choices in how to handle her upset and her desire for something different. I really believe she used it as an excuse to dress me down about her previous grievance.
Had she simply asked a few questions, she would have known to speak with the church leaders who had asked me to remove the cases. I could have directed her to them, to the source, and she could have spoken directly with them. But her angry outburst shut down the possibility of working through it together.
As it was, she did find herself in their presence after word got out about our blowup. I found it rather humorous. The leaders let her know that her behavior was unacceptable and encouraged her to apologize.
She found another church instead. — Jon Mullican
When the Lesson Gets Lost
The worst feedback I received was in graduate school from my lead professor. It concerned a large part of the curriculum and was delivered, intentionally and embarrassingly, in front of my fellow cohort participants.
The good news is that I was prepared to receive it, knew to expect it, and in some ways really wanted to hear it. After all, I was there to learn.
She led with a rousing lecture about Icarus and his fateful flight too close to the sun. She went into great detail about all the lessons she had taught me, how I had disregarded them all, and how the result was “my crashing and falling to my death in the sea.”
The challenge for me was the way the feedback was delivered. It felt like she wanted to make an example of me and show what could happen if one chose to lead in their own way.
Yes, it was precarious, but leadership is.
The passion of her storytelling and the level of detail she brought to it really drove home the point, especially the ultimate death of Icarus.
I took the feedback hard, and I was devastated, mostly because I felt I had done absolutely nothing right. I lost the valuable details about what I could have done better or differently because I was so focused on the metaphor's outcome.
I still think about that point in my life a lot, courageously trying new skills, taking risks, and learning to fly. — George Brewster
So, How Do You Know When Feedback Isn't Feedback?
What We Learned
These stories are different from one another, but they each show how quickly feedback can turn into something else. The same pattern shows up in different ways. Curiosity is missing, trust has worn thin, or a harsh delivery gets in the way of whatever might have been useful.
This is why discernment matters. Sometimes what is offered as feedback needs to be considered and questioned before it is taken in. Does the message help the person understand what happened and what they can do next? Is it grounded in specific examples? Is there enough trust for the conversation to be candid and direct?
Feedback that helps us grow usually gives us some agency. It leaves us clearer and more able to move forward, not smaller.
Maybe that is why George's later suggestion feels so useful: what if we thought less about feedback and more about a learning conversation? This is what George's suggestion points toward: a learning conversation where two people try to understand together what happened and what might be possible next, rather than one person correcting another from a position of power.
That does not mean all feedback is valid. What gets called feedback sometimes needs to be questioned before it's trusted, weighed instead of swallowed whole. The healthiest response, more often than we admit, is simply saying "Thank you for sharing" and letting it go no further.
When feedback arrives as an ambush or a public lesson, sensitivity in the receiver is rarely the real issue. The likelier explanation is that it was never really feedback to begin with.
For Your Own Reflection
What kinds of feedback are hardest for me to receive, and from whom?
What helps me stay open when feedback is difficult to hear?
How can I tell when a feedback conversation is grounded in care and trust?
What kinds of feedback do I tend to take in too deeply?
What feedback have I needed to set aside?
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Real feedback leaves you with something to work with: a clearer picture of what happened and some sense of agency about what to do next. If it leaves you smaller instead, cornered, ashamed, or with no clear next step, it's worth questioning whether it was feedback at all.
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Feedback is grounded in specific, observable examples and offered with enough trust for a candid conversation. Criticism disguised as feedback often lacks both: it's vague, it arrives without warning, and it says more about the giver's frustration than the receiver's actual work.
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Pause before taking it in. A learning conversation, where both people try to understand what happened together, feels different in the body than a correction delivered from a position of power. If it feels like the latter, it's fair to set it aside and revisit it later, or not take it in at all.
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Often because it arrives as a surprise, without any earlier signal that a change was needed, or because it's delivered publicly rather than privately. Both remove the receiver's ability to prepare or respond.
Continue Building Your Leadership Practice
Discernment like this is built over time, in the company of people who can reflect things back to you honestly. That's the work our coaches do every day, and it sits at the center of our coaching programs. If you're ready to bring this kind of thinking to your every day work, we’d love to talk.