What the forward?
-
‘Feedback’ Is Now Too Harsh. The New Word Is Feedforward
More companies are ditching anxiety-inducing corporate lingo for what they see as gentler terms. Reviews become ‘connect’ sessions.
-
Oh, yeah, that has entered the jargon here too, like a couple years ago. Just that we are supposed to both give feedback (how
{thing}ended up) and feedforward (how to maintain/improve{thing}going forward). First time I heard about "feedback" being harsh, though. Is this from the same people who thinks "criticism" exclusively means to berate and trash someone/something?
-
@boomzilla Hard to tell if this is the same kind of oversensationalized nonsense about how kids these days hate thumbs-up emojis when literally everyone I've seen in all ages say those articles are BS.
Feedforward is such a stupid term, though. Not to mention, feedback is already such a neutral term. People say, "I got some feedback on my work" and I personally consider that to be way too vague to know whether that's a good thing or a bad thing.
And lol "review" becoming "connect" sessions. No. I like "review." Since I started working at age 16, any time my boss said he wants to "connect" I run screaming for the hills. If they say it's time for an annual review, the first thought that comes to mind is, "Oh goodie. A raise!"
-
Another stupid term that I've heard in recent presentations here at Initech: highlights and "lowlights"
-
@error Really? In my circles, "lowlights" has been around for decades. It's even in Chrome's speelchucker.
-
@HardwareGeek said in What the forward?:
@error Really? In my circles, "lowlights" has been around for decades. It's even in Chrome's speelchucker.
When I Google it I just get hair styles.
-
@The_Quiet_One said in What the forward?:
If they say it's time for an annual review, the first thought that comes to mind is, "Oh goodie.
Not me. I think, "More corporate nonsense. But I got to put up with it if I want to continue to get my paycheck."
-
Did we carefully evaluate all possible alternatives? I find that feedforward puts a lot of pressure and expectations into the system, on both sides.
Besides, finer-grained options may aid with making communication clearer. Feeddown would be what you receive from upper management (if it evokes images of force-fed geese, all the better). Feedup is going the other way, and pretty much automatically ends up in /dev/null, after all management is probably fed up by all the clever ideas that people "down there" have.
-
And at no point was the prefix '360' attached to the words mentioned, which surely should instil a level of terror into all concerned.
I'm amazed we don't hear more about 360
reviewsfeedbackconversations actually but then again that would imply the person in a lesser authority/power situation would ever honestly give feedback to the greater authority/power.
-
@Arantor said in What the forward?:
that would imply the person in a lesser authority/power situation would ever honestly give feedback to the greater authority/power.
Not a problem. At companies I've worked at that did 360 reviews, people got to choose which peers/subordinates got to submit feedback. "Name 3 people who are sufficiently familiar with your work to provide feedback." Of course they chose people who would give them favorable comments, even for peers with whom there was no power imbalance.
-
@boomzilla said in What the forward?:
‘Feedback’ Is Now Too Harsh. The New Word Is Feedforward
More companies are ditching anxiety-inducing corporate lingo for what they see as gentler terms. Reviews become ‘connect’ sessions.
Part of the
about this story that I think a lot of people are missing is that it's being pushed by HR.Generally speaking, if HR wants to give you feedback, it is because you're being accused of having fucked up.
My boss is an engineer. My peers are engineers. Just like everyone else, there's been plenty of times in my career where I've gotten useful constructive criticism from other engineers about things I could change to become a better engineer.
But I have two degrees in a very specialized field. HR people are trained in something very different and therefore don't have useful feedback in terms of becoming a better engineer.
Which is why "HR wants to meet with you" is a euphemism for "you're in trouble."
-
More companies are ditching anxiety-inducing corporate lingo for what they see as gentler terms.
Brilliant. Swap one anxiety-inducing term for another anxiety inducing term in future. Pat yourself on the back, we solved the workplace
I'm sure that in a few years "feedforward" will be replaced by another inane term because "feedforward" would be the bad word.
It really irks me when people think this is the solution instead of actually treating the underlying problem (but that would take much more work than changing the subject line in an email / meeting request). If your manager doesn't have the people skills to not be the source of anxiety (or worse, if they thrive on that sort of thing) then no amount of changing the terms would fix that...
-
@cvi said in What the forward?:
Feedup is going the other way, and pretty much automatically ends up in /dev/null, after all management is probably fed up by all the clever ideas that people "down there" have.
I worked in one place where employees did evaluate their supervisors. Yes, this struck me as unnatural. The most important factor in an employee's success or failure is always protecting the boss's ego.
-
@AgentDenton said in What the forward?:
If your manager doesn't have the people skills to not be the source of anxiety (or worse, if they thrive on that sort of thing) then no amount of changing the terms would fix that..
I think the problem is fundamental - people skills don't change the fact that the boss has the power to deal a blow to the subordinate's lifestyle. There's still anxiety. I place more importance on the boss's character/honesty/integrity than on their people skills/personality.
-
Well, to be honest, I've already had to explain few times that for people with background in EE, positive feedback is bad news.
-
@Kamil-Podlesak said in What the forward?:
Well, to be honest, I've already had to explain few times that for people with background in EE, positive feedback is bad news.
How so? It doesn’t imply poles on the right-hand side, and negative feedback can easily be just as unstable
-
-
-
@jinpa said in What the forward?:
@cvi said in What the forward?:
Feedup is going the other way, and pretty much automatically ends up in /dev/null, after all management is probably fed up by all the clever ideas that people "down there" have.
I worked in one place where employees did evaluate their supervisors. Yes, this struck me as unnatural. The most important factor in an employee's success or failure is always protecting the boss's ego.
Most places I've worked recently (well, last 15 or 20 years) do that - all part of the annual review process.
-
@jinpa said in What the forward?:
I place more importance on the boss's character/honesty/integrity than on their people skills/personality.
In my opinion positive character / honesty / integrity goes hand-in-hand with better people skills / personality. Exceptions apply, sure, but my point being these aren't mutually exclusive
I do agree that it is a fundamental problem. A friend of mine pointed out to me that many people promoted into management don't get the necessary soft skills training, and it really did make it make sense to me why the fundamental problem exists...
-
@AgentDenton said in What the forward?:
In my opinion positive character / honesty / integrity goes hand-in-hand with better people skills / personality. Exceptions apply, sure, but my point being these aren't mutually exclusive
The sleazy but charismatic sales man (high people skills, low ethics/integrity) is a really strong trope for a reason. They're not mutually exclusive, but they're not strongly correlated (at least in a positive fashion).
-
@Benjamin-Hall Every so often I am reminded that I live in naive-ville, and I forget about the fact that people aren't always neutral / good. Sometimes there are bad actors
-
@Atazhaia said in What the forward?:
Just that we are supposed to both give feedback (how
{thing}ended up) and feedforward (how to maintain/improve{thing}going forward).That's bastardization of the words though, because those are both part of feedback.
The terms feedback and feedforward come from control theory where feedback means the control input is adjusted based on the (past) outcomes, while feedforward means the control input is just set according to request and estimate and that's that. So feedback implies you adjust how you are doing
{thing}, and feedforward is just the manager telling you that they want you to do{thing}.
-
@AgentDenton said in What the forward?:
Brilliant. Swap one anxiety-inducing term for another anxiety inducing term in future
The word you're looking for is pejoration, aka the euphemism treadmill.
-
@AgentDenton said in What the forward?:
In my opinion positive character / honesty / integrity goes hand-in-hand with better people skills / personality.
I could not disagree more. Character and personality are orthogonal. There are pleasant people with low character and unpleasant people with good character.
-
@AgentDenton said in What the forward?:
@jinpa said in What the forward?:
I place more importance on the boss's character/honesty/integrity than on their people skills/personality.
In my opinion positive character / honesty / integrity goes hand-in-hand with better people skills / personality. Exceptions apply, sure, but my point being these aren't mutually exclusive.
: HEY! Quit being an asshole and do your fucking job!Assuming that the engineer that
is talking to is actually doing his job poorly, is demonstrating honesty and integrity.In most workplaces, though, that's bad people skills.
Sure, that's an extreme example and in almost all cases, there's a more euphemism-y way to phrase that criticism that would be better.
But there are a group of very fragile people in the workplace who can't take criticism at all unless it's couched in very, very heavy euphemisms. (This isn't a generational thing. I'm having a problem with the guy I share an office with. He's like this, and he's my father's age.)
It sucks, but ultimately HR has to threaten people's jobs sometimes if they're fucking up. If they've got to call it "feed forward" to get the point across - I mean it sounds dopey to me, but I'm not the one getting called to HR for being a fuckup.
-
@GuyWhoKilledBear said in What the forward?:
@boomzilla said in What the forward?:
‘Feedback’ Is Now Too Harsh. The New Word Is Feedforward
More companies are ditching anxiety-inducing corporate lingo for what they see as gentler terms. Reviews become ‘connect’ sessions.
Part of the
about this story that I think a lot of people are missing is that it's being pushed by HR.ALL of the
of this story is due to this being pushed by HR.In any company, HR is the most completely useless department, often to the point of actually being harmful to the operation of the company.
-
@cvi said in What the forward?:
Feedup is going the other way
Feedup is the name for meals in a prison.
-
@jinpa said in What the forward?:
@cvi said in What the forward?:
Feedup is going the other way
Feedup is the name for meals in a prison.
I thought that was called "slop".
-
-
@HardwareGeek Unpopular opinion: Kirk was better than Picard.
-
@jinpa said in What the forward?:
@HardwareGeek Unpopular opinion: Kirk was better than Picard.
Different kinds of leaders for different eras of needs.
-
@jinpa Being of a certain age, I was a fan before there were any other captains to compare; therefore, I will always have great fondness for Kirk. However, there's a reason Shatner has his own entry in TV Tropes.
-
@HardwareGeek I think the reason is that opinions spread like viruses.
-
-
@jinpa said in What the forward?:
@AgentDenton said in What the forward?:
In my opinion positive character / honesty / integrity goes hand-in-hand with better people skills / personality.
I could not disagree more. Character and personality are orthogonal. There are pleasant people with low character and unpleasant people with good character.
Fair enough. This has not been my experience, but that is the beauty of discourse like this where I can learn things from multiple points of view
I do imagine that the "unpleasant people with good character" is only temporary. One or the other runs out soon. To me it takes a lot of effort to be unpleasant (and I would not even consider my character "good", more like neutral), so it's hard for me to fathom how one can sustain this. Not to mention, this might even just be situational (they are like this with colleagues but outside of the workplace they are totally different).
-
@GuyWhoKilledBear said in What the forward?:
@AgentDenton said in What the forward?:
@jinpa said in What the forward?:
I place more importance on the boss's character/honesty/integrity than on their people skills/personality.
In my opinion positive character / honesty / integrity goes hand-in-hand with better people skills / personality. Exceptions apply, sure, but my point being these aren't mutually exclusive.
: HEY! Quit being an asshole and do your fucking job!Assuming that the engineer that
is talking to is actually doing his job poorly, is demonstrating honesty and integrity.In most workplaces, though, that's bad people skills.
Sure, that's an extreme example and in almost all cases, there's a more euphemism-y way to phrase that criticism that would be better.
This is in the realm of Dr House where being right is the justification for being rude. However I do agree that it is extreme and most would even think twice before they do it that way (even if it is what they want to do).
But there are a group of very fragile people in the workplace who can't take criticism at all unless it's couched in very, very heavy euphemisms. (This isn't a generational thing. I'm having a problem with the guy I share an office with. He's like this, and he's my father's age.)
Yeah, I have seen this from all of the generations I've worked with. The older generations probably have some sort of trauma response from previous experiences where it went bad (often for no good reason). That's the kind of stuff that sticks with you for years and years. The younger ones can probably be explained by the uncertainty of inexperience (it's the first time this has happened).
It sucks, but ultimately HR has to threaten people's jobs sometimes if they're fucking up. If they've got to call it "feed forward" to get the point across - I mean it sounds dopey to me, but I'm not the one getting called to HR for being a fuckup.
Yeah, when HR gets involved like that it has reached the extreme point which is not pleasant for anyone involved. And some people do need the wake-up call that this is. Generally in the places I've worked at this is called "Performance Management" and it is as serious as it sounds. "Feedback" would already be the euphemistic term to me, but it might belie the severity of the situation.
