Likely everyone who clicked on this has had this or something like this happen to them.
I’ve come off as abrasive in the past when I in no uncertain terms correct people and comment on their attitudes. This is not an ideal strategy for doing well, and might short-change your longer term goals.
Let’s walk through the situation, and learn how to better approach a problem.
A higher up tells you that something is going wrong with the subtext that you’re doing something (or not doing something) that’s causing it.
This creates tension. You can literally feel your body going into fight or flight. After all, this is your career. The first thing to do is to recognize that people can make mistakes, but the more you seize upon their mistakes, especially in public, “that’s not quite right”, the more they’ll dislike you.
The first thing you want to do is make sure you understand what they’re saying. One method I use that I find successful is to repeat what they’re saying back to them in your own words, followed by, do I understand?
This immediately opens up the door to a positive interaction because it shows that you’re paying attention, receptive, and invested enough to listen closely.
From there, it can be helpful to determine what their goal is with this feedback. Are they trying to get you to change how you’re acting? What is the outcome they’re searching for? It’s ok to ask. “It sounds like this didn’t work…. How can I best take notes going forward?” This allows you to sidestep the question of fault, and instead understand what’s expected of you, and how you can meet it. It’s very hard to stay upset when someone is literally trying to learn how to follow your instructions going forward.
The other element of this is that it can actually reduce people’s unreasonableness. If they wanted you to be at two spaces in the same time doing two different things. Asking, “if you’re in my situation, how would you want this done?” and explaining why maybe you’re not sure the solution would solve the problem goes a long way to establishing coherence. Especially if this is public, this encourages kindness, as if someone’s being unreasonable, it comes off to other people.
When you’re in this situation, it’s important to give people charity. For the most part, people love the golden rule, and the more you focus on the objective goal, rather than the personalities involved, you’ll be better able to move forward.
If at some point it may be helpful to criticize back, I’d advise waiting. Criticism should be in private, objective, not eternalizing who people are (ex… you’re this type of person), and compassionate.
Would you respond better to “wow you did a terrible job with the notes because you can’t be trusted with administrative tasks.” Or “I noticed these notes lack due dates. I’m frustrated because it’s so out of character. Jenna, you’re so detail oriented, I know you can make sure all due dates are written down in the future.“? Notice how one points fingers while the other coaches.
In general, respond to feedback in the way that works for the person receiving it. Show people empathy? And they’ll show it back.
Isadore Johnson's Website 