Lunch & Learn | No Fear Feedback: How to give and receive feedback like a pro.

Feedback has a human impact.

We all give and take feedback in our day-to-day lives. Even if we put work to one side, feedback can be given to us by partners, friends, family, and just about anyone who we come into contact with. Yet that doesn’t stop it being challenging. And it’s easy to see why. Feedback that’s too judgemental can affect us deeply; from issues down the line with self-esteem, to even affecting our ability to perform at our best. Even receiving complimentary feedback can have the potential to make us cringe.

It’s embedded in the creative process.

Feedback is an integral part of our creative process. Whether it’s feedback from the client or from one another, it’s embedded in what we do every day. From initial concepts through to completion, clear, actionable feedback can help everyone realign and pull the project’s objective into sharper focus. Yet, most of us can recall a time when feedback was either too subjective, frustratingly vague, or not insightful enough to be of any real use.

Giving and receiving feedback is a life skill.

Enter Jodi and The Culture Club… Jodi joined us on a Tuesday lunchtime for a practical session, packed with actionable tips on how to navigate feedback across all areas of life. The workshop started with a group-wide acknowledgement that we can all improve through the understanding that feedback is a skill. And like all skills, it can be learned and practised.

The five-step process to navigate feedback.

Jodi offered us a five-step process to follow when dealing with feedback. She suggested framing feedback as ‘us working together to solve the problem’ rather than ‘me vs you’. In her experience, this is more effective. Referencing specific examples is helpful, as well as remembering to add in the human impact. Jodi’s belief is that there is no such thing as ‘bad’ or ‘good’ feedback, only helpful or unhelpful feedback.

Going away from the workshop, we agreed to support each other to improve our feedback skills as a team. It is this kind of shared insight from Jodi that will add real value to how we operate, both as a team and in our personal lives.

We’re already looking forward to the next ‘Lunch & Learn’ which will see our Account Director, Hayley, sharing wisdom from a Mental health First Aid course.

You can find out more about The Culture Club here.