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Why Not All Feedback Counts

7th October, 2020

Why Not All Feedback Counts

Can you do ANYTHING these days without being asked for feedback?

 

‘Can you rate your call with your customer service representative?’

‘How was your experience buying nasal hair trimmers with us today?’

‘How did you find looking at houses you can’t afford on Zoopla recently?’

 

It’s never-ending. But we’re taught in the business world that feedback is a good thing, right?

 

Whether it’s a client survey, online rating or 360 appraisal, we’re obsessed with gathering opinions to find out how we’re doing.

 

But we need to remember: all feedback is not created equal.

 

A few years ago I did a marketing workshop that had the most amazing response. People loved it and wrote wonderful things.

 

But as I scrolled through the feedback forms, I honed in on one person’s snipe that I was ‘too gushy’ in my delivery.

 

Ouch.

 

For a while it really niggled at me. I even considered changing my whole presentation style so I was less effusive and enthusiastic (the very things that had got the rest of the audience so inspired).

 

But luckily I read this brilliant HBR article by personal branding expert Dorie Clark, about when it’s ok to ignore feedback. It includes the killer line:

 

‘One person’s opinion isn’t a trend.’

 

Hell yeah.

 

If you listen to individuals at the expense of overwhelming opinion, you’ll take yourself off course. As you grow your personal brand or your business, there will be people who don’t like what you’re doing. And that’s ok.

 

As my favourite meme goes: ‘You can’t please everyone. You don’t even like everyone’.

 

So don’t take all feedback to heart. Be as discerning with it as you are with compliments. (And we both know how picky you are about those…)

accenture
UBS
Ricoh
Euromoney
University of Cambridge

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