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Short Summary
Main recommendation: Drop the labels "positive" and "negative" feedback, which carry a good/bad connotation, and instead think of feedback as appreciative and corrective, two sides of the same coin. The speaker argues that people struggle less with feedback itself than with feeling unappreciated, so making appreciation small, specific, and genuinely received makes both giving and receiving feedback easier.
Key Points
- Feedback, in the engineering sense the speaker borrows from the steam-engine governor, is simply information returning to its origin, which creates stability and enables learning.
- The "positive/negative" vocabulary introduced by engineers carries good/bad connotations that add unnecessary difficulty to giving feedback.
- People tend to resist feedback mainly when they do not feel appreciated, while feeling appreciated makes people seek out both appreciative and corrective feedback.
- People often brush off compliments because appreciation touches self-esteem and raises the question of whether they are truly valuable to someone.
- Appreciation hits harder when it is small and specific rather than big and vague.
- The speaker suggests the greater shortage is not of people giving appreciation but of people daring to receive it.
Details Worth Noting
- Concrete instructions:
- When giving appreciative feedback, expect some discomfort and respond by repeating your appreciation rather than backing away from it. For example, if someone says they only had the answer five minutes earlier, reply that it still really helped you solve the exercise yourself.
- Keep appreciation small and specific. Instead of "you're my best friend," say something like: "I was frustrated and didn't see an end to the exercise, and talking to you helped me go back and tackle it."
- To manage your own discomfort, recognize it first, keep the message small and specific, and be transparent, for example: "This isn't what I usually talk about, but I want to point out that this really helped me move forward. I should have said it last week."
- Before voicing appreciation, identify exactly what you appreciated, notice any small concern holding you back, and consider voicing that concern together with your appreciation.
- When receiving appreciative feedback, say thank you and genuinely take it in rather than brushing it off.
- The speaker describes the engineering governor as a set of balls that opens and closes a steam valve by reverting output information back to the input.
- The speaker says the connotation of "positive feedback" as "good" is what makes the concept harder, and that corrective and appreciative feedback follow the same underlying principles.
Bottom Line
Making appreciation small, specific, and actually received, rather than brushed off, is the most practical way to make feedback feel safe for both giver and receiver.
