At the end of every course I teach at IESE Business School, all participants give extensive feedback on their experience of the course, the facilities… and on my role as a teacher.
When the summarized feedback reaches me a couple of weeks later, I open the pdf in a state of nervous tension. I am preparing myself emotionally for the news contained in the report. If the report is positive, I start to relax and enjoy the feeling of professional competence.
However, the last few quotes on the report are always the “areas for improvement”. I get tense again, and start already to justify myself before I even start reading.
I love positive feedback. I hate “developmental” feedback. I pretend sometimes to appreciate it, but I resist it fiercely inside my mind.
I am pretty sure that I am not alone.
I rationally know that it is the developmental feedback that can most help me improve, but I find it very hard in the moment to accept it and work with it. I feel it as a personal attack, not as an objective opinion of a friendly student who wholeheartedly wishes to see the institution of IESE Business School improve with their advice.
What do you do to “accept” developmental feedback? Are there any things that have changed your willingness to be open to and even seek out developmental feedback?
