The Secret to Success Online: Accept Feedback

Last updated on March 27th, 2024 at 02:23 pm

To accept feedback is to set yourself free.

I want you to understand that once you start putting yourself and your dream into the world, you must be ready to accept feedback. Whether you like hearing what people think about your work or not, you cannot grow without it.

What will you do when people review your work online on places like Amazon.com?  What do you think actors do when their movie bombs at the box office and the critics rip their work to shreds?

To play with the big dogs, you’ve got to grow a thicker skin, and how you accept feedback determines your dream moxie.

I believe great athletes are successful because, at one point, they learned that accepting the feedback of a trusted coach is the key to making their dreams come true. They see feedback as coming from someone who sees their potential and is willing to help them bring out their best honestly. Successful athletes strive for excellence while learning from their mistakes.

Accepting feedback marks the difference between an amateur and a professional.

Yes, I know. I agree that there is some feedback you should ignore.  After a while, you will recognize jealousy and abusive chatter over feedback intended to help you to the top. How can you distinguish between healthy feedback and words from someone trying to put you down?

There is an easy way.

I’ve had some wonderful mentor-bosses in my day, and two of my favorite things are telling staff that you couldn’t come to them with a problem unless you had an idea for the solution. This criterion reduced the number of employees who only looked to complain without offering valuable feedback.

Good feedback is someone saying,

“Your blog is difficult to read on such a dark background. Has anyone said this to you before? I think if you ask your readers on Facebook they might offer some ideas. I understand white, light grey and ivory are very popular with readers.”

Verses

“Your blog is too hard to read so I won’t read it!”

Good feedback offers solutions. Constructive feedback allows room for ideas that you can implement. Effective feedback is like going back to school for your dream journey—it allows you to see where you have drifted off course.

And successful people know this.  Studies have proven that very high-achieving people welcome and accept feedback.

Dennis Wilson of Fast Company wrote a fascinating little piece on feedback in his article, “Thick Skin Thinking” —

“Research shows people that are better at handling negative feedback tend to be more successful–and those that can’t are less so.”

“Being able to accept feedback requires a modicum of critical self-awareness,” says Mark Murphy, founder of Leadership IQ and author of Hiring for Attitude. “If you are of the belief that you never make mistakes, you probably have a narcissistic personality disorder, and it’s going to be really hard to give you feedback. Somebody who has enough self-awareness to recognize they might need feedback, that’s the person that’s going to say ‘Even when I’m on my best game, there’s always something I could have done to be better.’”

Murphy says that high performers are often high performers specifically because they’re good at accepting feedback and using it as fuel for personal growth. He cites Peyton Manning as a good example: “One of the things that makes Peyton Manning effective is his critical self-awareness. He throws an interception, he knows it was a stupid throw the millisecond that ball left his hand. And he’s open to the feedback. He spends hours studying the film. And the interesting thing is that high-performers are way more open to feedback than the low-performers are. It’s the low-performers, when you ask them, ‘What’s a time that you received feedback?’ who say, ‘I don’t know, I don’t really get much feedback.’ Really?”

“Nobody who’s doing anything worthwhile is going to skate through a situation without feedback.”

Where do I go for feedback?

I am lucky to have people who give me constructive feedback about my work. I constantly ask for their feedback. I also comment on several top websites and stick my neck out in the comment sections asking for feedback, thus allowing strangers to hit me with comments.

Here’s the thing—if you were capable of making your dream come true, then it would have come true by now. It hasn’t because you need to grow more to move beyond where you are right now to where you need to be—the place where your dream resides.

Accepting feedback is the only way to get there.

Over the past ten years, I’ve watched some best-selling authors pass their book chapters around to each other for feedback — each making suggestions and changes to the author’s work and emailing each other about what isn’t working. I know of one author who spent a week at another author’s home helping edit and revise a book. Imagine someone dedicating a week of their life to editing your book!

The book went on to be a New York Times best-seller.

This is the stumbling place where writers either move into being paid for their work or the dream of writing stays within family and friends and never fully sees the light of day.  The same applies to people who want to become top influencers in their niche.  They can’t succeed unless they move past creating for themselves to creating with viewers in mind, seeing their feedback (especially the negative) in the comments, and appreciating that viewers cared enough to offer some insight–just ignore the trolls.

This is where many dreamers become frustrated and give up on their dreams by saying, “It’s too hard,” “I don’t feel comfortable doing this,” or, my favorite, “But I’ve always done it this way.”

That’s fear and low self-esteem masking as blocking feedback.  Trust me, I get it. Been there. Lived that.

I’ll leave you with what best-selling author Jack Canfield says about feedback:

“Once you begin to take action on a project or a goal, you’ll start getting feedback about whether you’re doing the right thing. You’ll get data, advice, help, suggestions, direction – and even criticism – that will help you constantly adjust and move forward, while continually enhancing your knowledge, abilities, attitudes and relationships.”

“But asking for feedback is really only the first part of the equation. Once you receive feedback you have to be willing to embrace it and respond to it.”

“Positive or Negative … it’s ALL good!”

“3 of the most common – and unproductive – responses to critical feedback are:

1. Caving in and quitting.
How many times have you or someone you know hit an obstacle and given up the goal because it was too hard or “not meant to be”? This is a poor way to respond to criticism, because all it does it keep you stuck in the same place.

2. Getting mad at the source of the feedback. (As an editor I have sooo lived on the receiving end of this one)
How many times have you responded with anger, hostility or resentment when someone has given you negative feedback? This serves only to push away the messenger and the feedback, when the message you’re receiving may be exactly what you need to hear to move closer to your goal.

3. Ignoring the feedback.
We all know people who tune out everyone’s point of view but their own. The sad thing is that the feedback they are blocking could significantly change their lives, if only they would listen.

If you fall into any of these traps, try to remember that feedback is not criticism. It is simply information – corrective guidance that’s meant to help to get you back on course to achieve your goal. I like to refer to negative feedback as information for “improvement opportunities.””

So before you continue your dream path, ask yourself how you accept feedback. If you can’t handle the opinions of others, then my suggestion is that you stop your journey and simply keep your dream as a hobby. Continue on with your day job.

Jack Canfield Video: Ask for Feedback