Feedback Loop

Crying isn’t an emergency!

When we were visiting family in England this past summer we ended up at a local fair in Sheffield. We walked around eating fried donuts and drinking tea (because England!), following two excited boys as they tried to settle on their favourite ride. It was like participating in one of those team building trust exercises watching them head into the lineup for one especially rickety looking mini-rollercoaster. I had little confidence in its construction and even less in the person who was buckling the boys in. He looked too bored with life to be in charge of kids, let alone their safety. The topper though was this sign:

Neither child was the crying type, but would MY tears have counted as an emergency?! In the end the ride remained intact but did not win the favourite award. It was “too spinny!” for the 8-year-old. As they made their way back to the safety of the bumper cars I stayed put and recovered from my own ordeal by scrolling through my phone, sipping my tea. I stopped on the picture I had taken of the sign: Crying is not an emergency.

This sign has me thinking about feedback. Giving it. Getting it. Getting it while giving it and having the humility to actually receive and learn from it. I continue to recognize the feeling in my body that comes with being a part of the feedback loop—a spinny ride feeling that starts in my stomach and travels down to my thighs. That feeling happens every time. This week, for example, it showed up when my dean sent me an email, gently but firmly noting something I needed to correct in a recently submitted set of final marks. I hate making mistakes! I pride myself on getting things right! And the last person I want to be vulnerable in front of is my boss. Thus, the feeling. I wanted off that ride immediately. I wasn’t defensive for I recognized my mistake. Instead, the feeling I was navigating was an intense desire to make up for the mistake then and there. I didn’t want to sit in the feedback and learn any more from it beyond simply not letting it happen again. It wasn’t my most teachable moment.

But there might be hope for me yet. In a recent birthday card from my mother she complimented my persistent spirit, shining a light on what she sees as my ability to stay on the ride, tears and all.

On the same day as the dreaded corrective email came in, so did a congratulatory email that has been five years in the making: “Your manuscript has been approved based on positive peer reviews. Please see the attached feedback forms for next steps.” Friends, I have received so much corrective feedback in the writing of this book! Truly, it is nothing like the one I first submitted five years ago. This new story was brought into existence because of feedback. All of the noes brought me to a yes. And reading those reports as I check in with my body tells me that a different feeling comes with having my course corrected when I see myself truly reflected in the feedback.

The way I carried my son when he was little is not terribly different from how I coach myself and others to carry corrective feedback forward, both given and received. With care. Feedback must be held with one truth in mind: it is powerful. It has the potential to be life changing. In my most mature moments I can reframe the get-me-off-this-ride feeling that inevitably shows up in my body when I receive feedback, trying to see through to its long-term corrective value. (Admittedly, easier to do when I’m the one giving the feedback.) Persistence is a practice and crying is not an emergency. Feedback is a tool for change—if we stay on the ride.