Do you receive good feedback? Isn’t that a brilliant position to be in? A place where you can learn and grow, and then go on to provide value to others. Great feedback about our work really pushes us forward. We all need someone else to cast an eye, give a second opinion or offer another point of view. Receiving constructive criticism is vital to our improvement and often comes with a sweet dose of encouragement, good advice and helpful suggestions.
Whether it is a coach, an editor, a like-minded colleague or your accountability partner…receiving honest evaluations of our work is vital to progress.
A good evaluation extends to you a wider vision of your work. It can guide you to see, what needs attention and what could be improved, how it could be smarter, brighter…less or more.
It can guide you to see the whole picture, the full view, from a distance, as if you were the audience, the reader, the client. It offers you the perspective, another angle of your endeavour or your assignment. It offers an idea of how your work resonates with your audience.
That information is so valuable because it can advance us, give a pointer to betterment, direct us to a breakthrough.
-Feedback is the breakfast of champions – Ken Blanchard
The evaluation for spoken or written works have much in common.
A speech, besides excellent structure and content requires from the speaker, eye contact, facial and body gestures, vocal variety and some rhythm and rhyme.
A written piece also needs an excellent structure and content…and some visual aids. Words need to jump off the page, to capture your interest, sound right, make sense and also have some rhythm and rhyme.
Let’s face it, if we cook a fine meal for a friend or loved one, if we put our love and energy into creating a delicious meal, or write a story from our heart and then we share it with the world…we want some reaction to it. We want the good vibrations of feedback. It is a normal human response to want to hear what others think of our ideas and thoughts. We all know that if we only express our talents to the mountains all we get back is our own echo.
So, who do you turn to for a positive evaluation of your work? For some informative feedback? Do you have a like-minded colleague with whom you can bounce off your work? Someone more knowledgable in your field, an editor or a coach? The other great way to share your work is in a mastermind group. Where a team of like-minded people can share and contribute achievements and challenges and benefit each other through pooled knowledge and experience.
– Sometimes you can’t see yourself clearly until you see yourself through the eyes of others – Ellen DeGeneres
Step Up & Stand Out encourages team and group work, so if you are looking for an accountability partner or a mastermind group, please contact me.
All good advice! As a writer, I truly appreciate any time readers take to comment and give constructive criticism of my work. Bad-mouthing someone’s efforts is a pointless exercise and sometimes a matter of sour grapes. Taste is so subjective: a) some may hate sagas or fantasy writing, while b) loves both, etc ., so – whatever genre you write in – and this applies to all creative work, be it music, art, acting, or writing, someone, somewhere is going to like/dislike it. FEEDBACK gives the creator some idea as to the direction/fruition or otherwise of their hard efforts and its value is much appreciated. Thank you.
I can´t agree more. The good feedback is vitally important part of our communication. Similarly in our biological life the nerve sensors report and inform our conscious mind through pleasure or pain or what is happening in different parts of our body. To receive accurate feedback about our actions are fundamental in our learning process.