Creative Feedback: Friend or Foe?

At one of my many day jobs, I worked in communications for one of the world’s largest banks. Not my dream job, but I had an office, so that was cool. When I wasn’t pasting press clippings into photo albums with solid gold covers for a former chairman (a real thing that happened), I got to work a fair bit with the CEO. It’s de rigueur to demonize bankers, but this guy was actually very decent.

I was with him on one occasion when he gave a speech to employees. He told a story about how he regularly received what he called, “I hate you and hope you go to hell” letters.

One particular letter was from a customer who was having trouble with their mortgage. On their behalf, the CEO called the processing office and asked the case manager to fix the mistake. The case manager informed the CEO that they would have to check with their boss before they could make the change. Slightly incredulous, the CEO responded, “I’m the chief executive officer of the bank… which boss, exactly, do you think you need to check with?” The case manager fixed the mistake. And the CEO learned his bank had too much red tape.

Why do I tell this particular story?

Facing Feedback

No matter what field you’re in, you’re going to get feedback, whether you want it or not. It could be in the simple form of two…