Respond, don’t react: navigate unexpected feedback

Hello, and a very warm welcome to Cultural Communication Confidence with me, Victoria Rennoldson. And, I want to start today with a story from a client who had a situation with somebody at work where they felt that they received feedback which was totally unexpected for them. And, they struggled to react and respond professionally in the moment. In fact, that feedback stayed with them for several days, and it ended up feeling like it was eating at them. And they got very frustrated by the feedback. They felt that it was unfair, unjustified, and didn’t know what to do with it. I thought this was a really important question, and I wanted to bring it to today’s podcast episode to talk about: how do we communicate effectively and professionally when we’re receiving tough feedback?

How do we in these situations respond rather than react to that feedback, particularly if we’re feeling some level of emotional reaction to it? Now, I want to take you through a number of different strategies to do this, and, I appreciate that sometimes we receive feedback when it is totally unexpected. It literally is sprung on us. But we also need to understand that for us to receive feedback, we need to be open to listen. So I want you to – let’s imagine a situation where you are being, told somebody has something to give you feedback about. I want you in that moment to really judge: are you in the right frame of mind to receive this feedback? Are you feeling clear, focused, able to pay close attention to what they have to say, or is there something distracting you? Is your attention drawn somewhere else? Are you feeling in the frame of mind to receive this feedback genuinely and openly? This question is really important because in that moment, if you find yourself saying,’no, I’m not ready to receive this’, then I think you have to be honest with that. I think you have to say to the other person something like, you know, ‘I would love to receive that feedback, and right now I realize that I’m not quite focused. Would it be okay if we scheduled another time to have this conversation? Because I really want to pay attention and be distraction free to receive that feedback.’ So that is a choice in the moment, know where you’re at and whether you’re in the right frame to receive that feedback.

If you decide, yes, you are, then make sure that you show that openness. Whatever is coming, it’s coming. So indicate through your nonverbal communication, your openness to receive. That includes how you’re sitting, how you’re listening and leaning into the conversation, what you’re doing with your hands and your eyes to indicate your attention to what they say. So this Is the first part openness to listen. The next part is they will receive that. They will give that feedback to you and you will receive it. Now, let’s say it is tough feedback, but you don’t actually agree with it. You feel in some way or form an emotional reaction to it. Irritation, frustration. How could they say this? That’s not fair. Just as my client experienced, if you find yourself in that situation, it’s really hard to clearly be able to not go into a situation where you’re defending yourself, justifying explaining what happened. And in some relationships, in some conversations, actually, that may not be helpful because it impacts the relationship dynamic and can lead to disagreement or even conflict.

So I think what can be helpful is starting off with acknowledging and appreciating the feedback, even if you totally disagree with it. And that sounds like something like, ‘thank you so much for taking the time to give me this feedback’. There is no judgment there whether you agree or disagree with it. You’re just purely acknowledging it. So this is quite important.

Then I want you to ask questions. I want you to get super clear that you understand what this feedback is about. So if it’s quite general feedback, make sure that you ask for specific examples or situations where they can demonstrate to you why this is important. So, for example, let’s say it’s about something that you haven’t completed. Can they give an example of a situation where this happened? The other thing that you can ask yourself, and you can also ask them, is, can you tell me a little bit more about why you’re sharing this feedback now? Has something happened repeatedly? Is this a new situation? Really get behind what’s driving the feedback? So these kind of, this kind of questioning is for you to help you understand the broader context, what’s happening, why is this feedback coming up now, and, how you can see it from their point of view. The empathy piece.

Now, this still may not stop you from having an emotional reaction. And, so this is where we really need to use our eq, our emotional intelligence, to ground in and to be present to their answers, rather than going off into the monologue in our minds about the frustration or whatever the reaction emotionally we’re having. This really requires you to stay in the moment, not to be wondering what you’re going to do about it, not wondering about how you’re going to respond, but really listening. And, that requires quite a bit of attention. So to help you with this, use your breath, notice how you’re breathing, and slow your breath down. I’ve mentioned these couple of techniques in another episode recently, but just ground your feet, feel your feet flat on the floor. And if you’re holding, for example, a pen, like pick up a pen and just feel the pen in your hands. Whatever it is that works for you, just make sure that you’re using these ideas to really keep the emotions calm. This is important. Now the next part of this is space, grace and time. And I really think in some situations when we are receiving tough feedback, unexpected feedback, we need to reflect on it.

I know that I experienced this myself in a previous career, and I really needed time to process what was being said to me and, what I needed to do next. And you can acknowledge that you can say that you want to reflect on that feedback and to then think about what comes next before you respond. So give yourself that space. If we want to respond thoughtfully, mindfully and professionally, then we may need that time. And that might be potentially several days, if that is an option where you can sleep on it. And that sometimes also takes out the emotion from your immediate reaction. So give yourself that space, grace and time now. From there you may need to follow up and that might mean a further meeting with that person to give them your thoughts on what it is you’re going to do with that feedback that might be appropriate and particularly important when the relationship dynamic is really important, such as between yourself and a customer or client, or with a line manager, or maybe with a peer internally that you need to work with well and, effectively to achieve your goals. So think about this. If there is any sort of important relationship dynamic, it might be really important to go back to respond with the reaction to that feedback, but what it is you plan to do with it and how things are going to change, what you personally are going to change in your communication approach and behavior to address that feedback.

The final piece of this is really taking time to reflect, thinking. When we receive unexpected feedback, this sometimes can be a gift to us because it’s a blind spot. It’s something we haven’t seen about ourselves. So even if the initial reaction to it is: ‘how dare they’, or ‘I don’t believe this is true’, really just take the time to consider what parts of it could be true, what elements of this are, important to learn from? How do you avoid this in the future? What is it maybe that you do need to own? Maybe you have made a mistake or done something not in the right way and that needs changing. Really take the time to think about these questions and, consider the feedback as an opportunity for you to learn, even if you don’t initially fully agree with it.

So there you go. These are my steps to respond and not react when you receive unexpected tough feedback. I hope this is helpful in the situations that you experience and you can also use today’s episode to think about it. Also, when you are giving that tough feedback and how that might be received, how you can help the other person receive that feedback well? So that is the other great insight from today’s podcast episode.

So when have you received tough feedback? How did you react or respond to it? What is most useful from today’s episode in the strategies to help you in these tough situations? I would really love to know and I loved to get your feedback about what is it that you find most valuable from these episodes. So feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn, my personal profile, Victoria Rennoldson, and you can message me over there. And, if you are somebody who is having challenges with responding rather than reacting, if you find yourself, emotionally reacting in certain situations in the workplace and want to understand better how to communicate when you’re experiencing these situations, then I would love to be able to help you with this. Feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn. Let’s have a conversation how I can best support you. In the meantime, thank you so much for joining me here today. It’s been brilliant to see you and look forward to seeing you next time on Cultural Communication Confidence.