Growing up in a household or being in an environment where you get mostly or only positive feedback, you will expect that type of feedback in all areas of your personal and professional life. How helpful is the (mostly or only) positive feedback for the person receiving it in the long run? Is that positive feedback motivating the person or setting up expectations/beliefs that are not really assisting her or him? If only positive feedback is being given by a coach to an athlete/by a parent to a child/by a manager to an employee, then it can be more counterproductive than productive.
Constructive feedback is better for us. We need to know where we are good at and where we need to improve. When we get feedback of our strengths and improvement areas, we can allocate our time, energy, and focus accordingly. If we become tempted to create a perfect world of positive feedback from coaches to athletes, parents to children, and managers to employees, we are being in the fixed mindset. It’s important to adopt a growth mindset which “leads to a desire to learn and therefore a tendency to embrace challenges, persist in the face of setbacks, see effort as the path to mastery, learn from criticism, find lessons and inspiration in the success of others. As a result, they reach ever-higher levels of achievement” (Carol S. Dweckâs Mindset: The New Psychology of Success)
How are you using the feedback you are getting?