You Need Brave Feedback; Not Gentle Coddling

Detailed Transcript

 Today’s episode might sting a little bit, uh, and that’s kind of the point. Today I’m returning to a crucial topic, with a slightly different angle. It’s an element of your career that quietly shapes salary, promotions, credibility, influence, network power, and even your stress level.

We are returning to the topic of feedback and specifically -and maybe rudely -why you woman in tech need to stop being so fucking precious about feedback. The positive, the neutral and the negative.

Maybe especially the negative.

 Welcome to the Build Your Brave Career Podcast, where we flip the script on the tired stereotype that women in and around the tech industry have to be stressed out, overworked and underpaid. I’m Nicole Trick Steinbach, the International Bravery Coach and your host.

Forget what you’ve been taught: bravery is not a personality trait available only to the brash. Bravery is a skill and you already have it, which is great because building the skill of bravery is the most powerful way to creating the career and life you really want.

As you build your brave. You will stress less, work less, and then earn more.

This podcast will help you do just that. Let’s dive in.

 This is gonna be a longer episode because normally I would break it into a series, but, um, frankly, I am deeply concerned about patterns I’m seeing in women in tech, so I brought all of it into one episode.

This is your opportunity to practice getting feedback ’cause I’m talking to you.

All right, as usual, right up front, let me draw a very strict line. The rest of this episode is a, not about tolerating abuse, bias, toxic workplaces especially, quote unquote feedback wrapped in a small smile of just giving you some feedback, but it’s actually rooted in sexism, classism, racism, or just power games.

And that is not feedback. That is not what we’re talking about for the rest of this episode. That is harm. That’s a different topic. Reach out to me if that is a situation that you’re in because you need a partner.

Okay, but back to the topic: we are talking about constructive feedback, developmental feedback, growth feedback, and yeah, sometimes it’s blunt feedback.

It is all career generosity, but too many people, and you may be one of them, treat it as a personal attack.

When you respond personally and you start avoiding the situations, the people, the projects or the products that brought you the feedback, you cut yourself at the knees and your growth, your career growth is cut down in one clean, repetitive swoop, while also multiplying your internal and external stress so many times over.

Let’s not do that. Let’s figure out how to get and give feedback.

The first thing that I’m going to do is I am going to acknowledge that in tech environments, it doesn’t matter which part you’re in. Leadership, uh, development, engineering, um, project, hey, even change management, HR, all of it. Growth is accelerated by iteration and feedback.

Lemme give you some examples:

Code: it’s reviewed, rejected, enhanced, released.

Products: designed, tested, reviewed, passed over or made better and then shipped, or not.

Roadmaps: they’re managed. They’re updated. They’re escalated. They’re critiqued. They’re praised. They’re wrapped up.

If we didn’t use iteration, if we didn’t track what is and what is not working, we wouldn’t move forward.

Code would stay dormant. Products would never hit the market. Roadmaps, and reports would disappear into folders with no impact.

And entire companies would stagnate.

We need iteration and we need feedback. You know this, I know this, and hopefully after this episode you’re not just gonna see this for code or products or clients or roadmaps or any, but also for your career.

Because here’s the problem I’m seeing: so many women in tech know that we need blunt, iterative feedback for what we do.

But then when it becomes your own performance: you want gentleness, you want cushioning, you want coddling, you want emotional protection.

And when someone is generous enough to give you direct, clear feedback through their words or through their actions, suddenly you are too precious to find the gems.

Come on. You wouldn’t do that for your code or your product or your project, or your clients or your services. Don’t do it for yourself.

In the last year, I have to tell you, I have watched with horror as more and more people globally, and especially women, have become more timid in giving feedback and more overtly avoiding getting feedback.

Cut. It. Out.

I see it in my coaching consults. I see it in my consulting. I see it even with some returning clients. It has to stop.

‘Cause here’s the reality: feedback is how enjoyable careers, lucrative careers, brave careers are built and built with a lot less stress and a lot faster.

Don’t trust me. Go find it on your own.

Harvard Business Review, Forbes, BBC, Der Tag have repeatedly published research from a variety of institutes that show that leaders across industries who actively seek and implement action based on feedback are rated as more effective and trustworthy by their teams and colleagues.

They stress less, they learn more, they have more balanced lives, and they consider themselves, and –this is the one I find most intriguing– people who work through feedback consider themselves more successful than others.

Why? Because coachability signals maturity. It shows emotional regulation. It signals growth, capacity and growth.

Capacity is where your stress drops. Your workload becomes more enjoyable and more manageable. That’s when you begin to see a career, a brave career, that lines up your functional expertise, your values, and yourself to greater and greater goal achievement.

But hey. Let’s not stop here. So we’ve acknowledged tech and how important iterative, direct feedback is, but let’s look at the other side.

You and I both know that women are held to higher standards, and we are promoted based on performance. While men are given chance, after chance, after chance and promoted based on their potential.

Don’t take my word for it. Go look it up. ’cause the research has been clear since the 1970s. I wasn’t even alive in the 1970s. Most of you listening right now, also, were not alive in the 1970s, so it’s true.

In addition to that, you may be the only woman in rooms. Or you may be the youngest. Or the foreigner. Or the lesbian. Or the single one. Or the single mom one. Or, or, or maybe you’re the non-traditional hire.

So for you, feedback feels more threatening, but actually it’s even more important for you than for others.

You need to be seeking out, receiving, accepting, and working through feedback way more than others and by others here we both know I mean dudes.

So sure. When someone says, and uh, and I’m about to share with you actual quotes my clients have received recently at work. I went through my coaching notes and I pulled out some of the quotes that they’ve heard. So here we go.

Here’s what some, someone might say to you:

“you tend to overexplain.”

“You need to be more concise.”

“Can you smile more in meetings?”

“You need to push back more.”

“You need to show more strategic thinking.”

When you hear that, it might feel like confirmation of your deepest fear: “I don’t belong here. This is not for me. I’m not good enough. I won’t ever fit.”

You defend, you avoid, you blame. You make it personal. You spiral into stress, lowering your impact and your joy. Eventually you shut down completely ending your career growth.

For what? Because here’s the hard truth, defensiveness, blame, personalization: they are far more damaging than the original feedback.

The original feedback, as I’ve already said, was a gift.

I can tell you firsthand from my own leadership and management background, from coaching so many leaders across industries and from being in community with other women who have reached that director, vice president, senior vice president, et cetera, I’m with them in community:

they are looking for how you respond to feedback.

“Can she take it? Can she hear it? Can she reflect on it? Can she decide?”

They’re not looking for, and no decent colleague or reasonable leader is looking for, is she perfect?

They are looking for, can she process, reflect, decide, adjust and move forward.

If you can, that’s presence. You are more trustworthy. You are ready for new opportunities and for more space.

When you respond to negative feedback with curiosity, instead of preciousness, you will change how you are perceived.

Imagine this response: “thank you for the feedback.”

Imagine this one: “thanks for the feedback. I’m not sure I understand. Can you tell me more?

Or how about this one? “Thanks for the feedback. Hey, can you give me one specific example? I really wanna understand this better.”

Those responses, they demonstrate emotional control, accountability, analytical or reflective thinking, your commitment to listening, understanding, and growth.

That is the energy that meets feedback and turns it into the future.

Now side note, always a side note: no point in time in this entire episode will you hear me say you have to take all the feedback., Uh, you still have to put on your strategic head, reflect on your values, consider what pieces you want to take, and what pieces you are going to leave.

Because here’s another brave truth: the women who enjoy their careers and reach their goals are not the ones who never get criticism. They’re also not the ones that put every single piece of feedback into action.

I certainly do not.

Instead, they are the ones who are seen improving over time, in line with their values, their purpose, their goals, their boundaries, and yes, their bravery.

We’ve talked about receiving. We also have to talk about the other side, which is giving.

Professionalism isn’t just about receiving, it’s also about delivering. And many, many, many women in tech are softening your feedback so much more than you were a few years ago.

To the point where honestly it becomes utter, utterly useless.

Are you wrapping your feedback in disclaimers? Like, “I might be wrong. Um, it’s probably just me. I don’t wanna offend.”

Or are you entirely avoiding it because you don’t wanna be perceived as quote “mean.”

Which I totally get because as a direct woman, and we’re gonna talk a little bit more about this later in the episode, but as a direct woman who speaks with authority, I’ve been called mean so many more times than I can count.

And I want you to hear this from me. Now, this is Nicole Trick, Steinbach speaking here. Being called mean. It has never, ever been from someone who is more skilled at their job or my job than me. Never. And it’s never been from a person that I respected or admired, never. And honestly, there have been more than a few moments since 2009 when I heard my mentor extraordinaire Pete, tell me, ‘Hey, wear that label as a badge of your honor and your excellence.’

So lean in here and take this one, regardless of your seniority, your function, your age, or a, your location, anything, here is a leadership reality, mean or not:

if you cannot give clear feedback, you cannot thrive in a team.

You cannot grow into leadership.

You cannot uncover and discover your own excellence, so you certainly cannot do so with and for others.

Avoiding feedback to be nice doesn’t make you nice, quite frankly. It makes you unclear and often untrustworthy.

Now, I’m not saying run around and be actually mean or cruel or racist or sexist or anything. Remember what I said at the beginning of the episode.

What I am saying is give professional, helpful feedback. And sometimes my clients, or when I’m speaking publicly, I get asked, what does that mean? So I’m gonna give you an example that I like to use.

We’re not gonna give mean feedback. So mean feedback would be, or unhelpful feedback would be something like this. After the meeting, I say to my colleague, “Hey, uh, you keep interrupting hr. Stop it. Be professional.”

No, no, no, no, no, no. What I’m talking about is giving feedback like this privately and after the moment. “I’ve noticed in the HR meeting that you jumped in before our HR BP finished speaking, that might impact how they perceive our willingness to work with them. Walk me through what’s going on, because right now I’m seeing how it might be beneficial for you to work on pausing before responding.”

Sure, maybe somebody thinks that’s mean, but it’s actually specific, it’s situational and behavior based, and it’s forward looking.

I also asked a question about, Hey, tell me what’s going on here. ’cause maybe there’s something I just don’t know in the dynamic.

That is professionalism.

So, uh, we’ve referenced it a couple of times, but let’s be direct about it, okay. And this is gonna be hard. A lot of you are not going to like this.

Women in every single industry, including nursing and teaching, are penalized for being direct.

Research from so many cultures and from so many different institutes show that women who give direct feedback are rated as less quote “likable” than men who do the same things.

It’s frustrating, it’s real. It’s my career summed up in three sentences. But here’s the thing: likability is not the leading rating criteria for career success.

You must stop optimizing for likability.

You must stop.

People who rate high as choosing likability over effectiveness, burnout more often make less money and are held at a glass ceiling earlier in their career. Usually somewhere between senior consultant and senior manager.

Again, this is not what I say. This is what research says.

You have to stop optimizing for likability and start optimizing for clarity and for effectiveness.

When your feedback is anchored in performance, in situations and behavior, not personality, you actually protect yourself.

Sure, you could be direct and the person could still be defensive.

Yeah, that can happen. It happens to me all the time, but that doesn’t change me. In fact, that what has changed for me in giving the feedback is I trust myself more.

What has changed when someone gets weird about feedback is that I trust them less because they’ve shown me, they have a limited capacity.

Feedback is not identity; feedback is data, and that’s the mindset shift.

I want you to write down: feedback is data, not identity.

When you choose to continue the habit of being precious about feedback. If you choose to continue to avoid the conversations, avoid the situations, the projects, the products, and you choose to take it personally and to retaliate defensively or withdrawal: you are not ready.

That will be the label that’s on you “not ready.”

Maybe not immediately, but it will happen. Not because you lack the intelligence or the skills or the work ethic or or the relationships even, but because you lack capacity to grow.

Decision makers, influencers and colleagues, they’re all gonna see it and they’re gonna know you cannot handle your own role so you definitely cannot handle more.

How do you turn this around? How do you turn this around? Maybe it’s a turnaround, maybe it’s a strengthening. Let’s find out.

I want to give you three steps. They’re simple. Like all simple things, it requires you to be consistent.

So let’s talk about how can you get more brave about feedback?

Number one, separate what is actually said from what you make it mean. Concretely, if you receive feedback, write down the exact, exact words that are used.

Then after the conversation, write down the story you are telling yourself.

I’ll give you a concrete example that just came from a client and was the final straw for me to make this episode.

What she was told, concretely, was your presentations go long. That was it. Your presentations go long.

What she made that mean by the time we got onto the coaching call was, “I’m horrible at public speaking. Everyone knows I’m incompetent. I shouldn’t have this role. I’m never gonna grow, and the kicker, I’m too fat for this outfit.”

Listen, most suffering lives in the story, and I think you and I can agree that “your presentations go too long” is not what she made it mean.

You have to practice editing the nonsense you tell yourself and focus on the wisdom or the gift that is being given to you.

The second thing is that you need to make feedback a habit.

You do not build a skill by avoiding the skill. You cannot get comfortable with something if you avoid the discomfort of growth.

I want you to set yourself a monthly challenge. I’m going to give you an example from a past client: her challenge was to ask a peer, one peer for constructive or growth feedback.

Over time she went from asking people she knew would give her very gentle feedback to talking to the software architect who laid it flat and revolutionized her career.

The second thing that she had as her monthly challenge was to offer one piece of feedback to someone that she worked with.

The last one that we added as she built the habit, was to give herself at least 24 hours before she reacted.

If this helps: treat feedback as a habit, sort of like strength training. I want you to start with really low weights and then build up over time, and you gotta do it more than once a week.

Okay?

The third piece, and this is gonna be the one that you’re gonna wanna avoid the most, so definitely do it. As soon as you finish this episode, I want you to make a list of three people you work with who might not be your biggest fans.

Over the next six weeks, you’re gonna ask those three people for feedback. I know that this freaks a lot of people out, so I’m gonna give you a script. You’re gonna pop ’em a message and you’re ask, gonna ask for a few minutes of their time. You’re gonna share with them that you’re in a growth phase and would be deeply grateful for their insights, suggestions, and feedback.

Then you’re going to ask them prepared questions like:

“what really worked in that situation?”

“Where do I miss the mark?”

And the power question: “what’s one behavior I could adjust immediately and it would make a significant difference?”

Take it. Write down the exact words. Don’t listen to your brain.

Thank them, thank them, thank them with your whole heart. Because they just gave you one hell of a gift.

In closing, if you are serious about building your brave career. If your goals include stressing less, working less, and then earning more, you can not afford to be precious about feedback.

You have to be brave with it.

You gotta receive it, refine it, deliver it, normalize it, because bravery in your career isn’t just about bold moves. It’s about the sustained consistent shifts.

Sometimes it’s about sitting still in a moment of critique and choosing your growth instead of your ego.

That is the kind of bravery that changes trajectories and legacies.

One moment at a time, and that is your brave career, so build it

and wink, wink send me feedback:

what’s working for you with this podcast?

What isn’t?

How can I help you as a coach?

What could I offer, or host, or deliver that would serve you in your brave career?

Till next time.

  If the Build Your Brave Career Podcast is helping you flip the script in your own career, if it’s helping you reduce your stress, work smarter or create more income, please share this with a friend. Until next time, you are already brave. Now go build your brave.