How to manage criticism/feedback while at work

Are you the type that doesn’t like people criticizing you? The fact is that other people see your flaws better, so learning how to accept criticism is vital if you want to improve at work.

No one likes being criticized. Be it a boss criticizing an employee for doing a bad job or a client giving critics on a designer’s work, it is human nature to take criticism negatively be it constructively or destructively. When criticized we get disappointed and damage our self-esteem in the process. What most of us don’t understand is that criticism is important for personal improvement and growth. Criticism is a good thing because it showsshows that your peers are invested in your future and want to help you learn or keep you grounded. How we perceive it is entirely up to us. If you stop being self-conscious and open your mind (given that the other party hasn’t badly treated you), you will be able to gather benefits from it.

According to Dale Carnegie he quotes:

Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain but it takes character and self control to be understanding and forgiving.- Dale Carnegie

There are two types of criticism which are Constructive and Destructive criticism :

Constructive criticism focuses on the common goal while Destructive criticism digresses from the common goal

To cite an illustration: You are the stakeholder of your company and Mister Shola and Miss Rihanat are to reports to you in your office. Mister Shola used displeasing language on Miss Rihanat and Miss Rihanat gives a complaint about it. If you tell Miss Rihanat, Miss Rihanat, if Mister Shola used displeasing language, you return it with displeasing language, retaliate” is destructive feedback. On the other hand,, you tell Miss Rihanat to talk to Mister Shola regarding this and take appropriate action. And, I’m very happy about your behaviour during this disagreement as you’ve behaved professionally by not using displeasing language in return. This is an example of constructive feedback.

Constructive criticism can simply be understood as feedback that a person receives that aims at pointing out the flaws of the person so that he can improve.

Destructive criticism can simply be understood more as plain-spoken accusations that make the person feel hurt and worried.

Here are 5 tips to help you manage criticism while at work:

• Listen to understand: Seek to understand what the speaker is saying by reflecting on the information. Paraphrase what you’ve heard and ask questions to clarify any points you may not fully understand.

There are 3 A’s of active listening: Attitude, Attention and Adjustment: play a key role in listening. Once you understand how these impact your listening, they most likely will stay in your mind and keep you on your toes when it comes to the times you need them the most. Just make sure that you take the time to absorb what is being communicated to you.

• Don’t be too hard on yourself: Remember that everyone makes mistakes and has things to learn. When you are too hard on yourself, you won’t be able to focus on positive feedback. However, you can make conscious efforts to focus on positivity. Give yourself a moment to process the feedback and decide if you can learn from it

• Define your plan: Criticism has advantages and what you can do to improve yourself. Now it is time to create a plan to address the issue so that you can learn from it and not get told off for the same reason in the future.

Follow the SMART rule to plan your areas of improvement when defining your plan

_Be Specific

_Be Measurable

_Be Achievable

_Be Realistic

_Be Timely

• Take notes. It can be hard to take criticism, but it’s even harder to receive the same criticism twice, so be sure to outline the main points and ideas, and most importantly ask questions to take the task right next time.
• Appreciate him/her at the end of the conversation and start revising: As hard as it can be to accept criticism, it’s still important to be gracious and thank people for the time they are taking to help improve your work. Even if you don’t feel thankful in the moment, you’ll be glad you said it when you see your skill level improve.

I hope these simple ideas will make you a better feedback-taker.

Thank you for taking your time to reading this and don’t forget to give a clap 👏👏, also do well to share with friends