If you look at the neuroscience, the way that
we're wired has a profound effect on how we
hear and respond to feedback.
Now, we took a look at three variables that
are particularly important in terms of your
reaction to feedback.
The first is your baseline.
In the literature this is called set point
sometimes.
It's sort of a how happy or unhappy are you
in the absence of other events in your life.
Where's that level that you come back to?
If it's a scale of one to ten.
Some people just live their lives at nine.
They're just so unbelievably happy and cheerful
about everything, you know from like a cup
of coffee to a promotion they're just thrilled.
This research comes from looking at lottery
winners.
A year later they're about as happy or unhappy
as they were before they won the lottery.
And people who go to jail, a year later they're
about as happy or unhappy as before they went
to jail.
Now, the reason this matters for feedback,
particularly if you have a low set point or
baseline, positive feedback can be muffled
for you.
The volume is turned down; it's harder for
you to hear it.
Now, we look at the second variable, which
is swing.
When you get positive or negative feedback
how far off your baseline does it knock you?
The same piece of feedback can be devastating
for one person and, you know, kind of annoying
for another.
And then the third variable is how long does
it take you to come back to your baseline.
How long do you sustain positive feeling or
how long does it take you to recover from
negative feeling.
So taken together that's where the big variation
in sensitivity comes from that some people
are extremely sensitive and other people are
pretty insensitive, or maybe I should say
even keel.
But I suppose if you're insensitive you don't
really care what I call you so it doesn't
matter.
Here's why this is particularly important.
There are two reasons.
One is your own footprint or feedback profile,
not only influences how you receive feedback,
it also influences how you give feedback.
So if you're pretty even keel it could be
that you're more likely to be pretty direct
or other people would describe you as harsh
in your feedback because you think like this
isn't that big of deal; you're overreacting
to it.
Other people who are very sensitive are likely
to tiptoe around issues.
And if they're talking to someone who's pretty
even keel like they're not even understanding
that you're giving them feedback.
Like you have to be pretty direct to even
get through to them.
The second reason it matters is that particularly
if you swing negative it can actually distort
your sense of the feedback itself and your
sense of yourself.
So in terms of distorting your sense of the
feedback itself, it's almost like it super
sizes it.
You know, one piece of feedback triggers sort
of an overwhelming flood where the feedback
itself overruns its borders.
It's not one thing it's everything.
It's not now it's forever.
And you could fall into what we called the
Google Bias.
It's as if mentally and emotionally you Google
everything that's wrong with me and you get
like 1.2 million hits.
All your past mistakes, failed relationships,
bad judgment, you know, there are sponsored
ads from your father and your ex and it's
suddenly everything you can see about yourself.
The challenge in the book is how do you dismantle
the distortions so that you can see that's
feedback itself at actual size and it doesn't
become so big and overwhelming that you're
actually not in a place to learn and you're
not hearing the feedback for what it does
represent and what it doesn't present.
