The Joy of giving Positive feedback - Humanising our experience as Customers

 

Counter-Intuitive Idea that Customers have a Responsibility

What is Positive Feedback?

A Few Days back I got the whacked idea of just telling some of the service providers they were doing a great job.

Practising Assertiveness has been quite awesome, but sometimes People can mistake me for a d*ckh@3d. Lol, Sorry for using the expletives. But it clearly brings out the right feeling of how people would feel about someone being only assertive.

The important thing is that it made me feel so good to appreciate another person. Though I was paying for the service, encouraging another to serve better... I wasn't going to lose anything.

So to understand Positive Feedback, I would like to start with defining it. To each one Positive Feedback could mean something different. 

I will be using a  Management Definition of Positive Feedback. According to Better Team, It is defined as, "Positive feedback is given to employees when they meet or exceed business targets, overcome a challenge, go the extra mile, or introduce innovative ideas."

So in the context of Management, it is used to encourage employees to meet or exceed business targets or overcome challenges.

Definitions apart I think it is a great practice. If we think it through this practice is also relevant in our daily lives. We could apply this Management concept to people who provide us with a service or add value to us.

It helps encourage positive behaviour and it helps us express Gratitude that builds people. I believe this is a really transformative and personally self-building habit to have.

So now let us delve into how this could be important.

Why is positive feedback important?

I want to start by looking at the Telos for Positive Feedback. The hints of it are included all around the definition.

It is also included in our understanding of Feedback. Feedback is generally used in the context of Management to help the employee understand how they have been working. The employee gets an idea of how they are working with standards and fulfilling company objectives.

Positive feedback tells an employee they are doing a good job. This feedback is also important to a lot of Professionals that serve us every day.

They could be self-employed or local small businesses who are doing their work better than expected. 

Positive feedback is important for them too. It would help them get more passionate about their work and get healthy support. (that all of us need often)

How to give Positive Feedback...

So there are different ways to do that. A lot of it is quite simple and just requires recognising the value the other person has created for us. I am going to give some pointers on how to give feedback to anyone. 

Point Number 1: Coupling Positive Feedback with Negative Feedback

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Giving Positive Feedback does not mean you don't tell them where they need improvement. It would sometimes come to our minds how the other person may receive it. But to think about it, we don't control people's reactions. The courtesy shown with intentions and love should be something that helps us understand that we are using our expression of Gratitude constructively.

Point Number 2: Using Positive Language

Mention positive points and speak about any issues too

This could be when writing feedback or even telling the person. You could simply mention what you like about it. You could also use simple expressions like 'Well Done' or 'Fantastic' etc. If you are super impressed you could say things like "Fantastic!" or "Awesome" etc.

Point Number 3: Medium doesn't Matter, But the timing does

Feedback is good

Each of us has our own way of expressing ourselves. One could write a note or drop a review online. Tell the person about what impressed you about the work he or she did directly. I think besides doing this, timing also matters. So how do we know the right time to give a business or professional feedback? When we see that it would relevant to the person. One hint could be you see that they are going the extra mile to do a good job.

Positive Feedback Situations

Here are some situations that I can think of:

• Customer Service Person was better than expected

• The teacher gave an interesting Lecture

• Health care professional helped you get better

• A Local Business gave you a huge discount

There are innumerable situations that can encourage people and build them up. Feedback is a very essential component to grow better. We all need it, but not the destructive kind that tears people down. So whether you are giving positive or negative feedback it is both healthy and essential.

You could use some of the pointers I gave you earlier and drop a line or two on paper. 

You could even tell the person and share a positive review online.

In Conclusion

I think all of us would love to hear kind and encouraging words that break our routines and remind us we are doing things make a difference (though we do not realise it).

Receiving feedback can be difficult, but constructive and well-communicated feedback can really help people.

Please do consider sharing any constructive feedback, it would be a blessing. Do like & share this article.

Thank you for stopping by. I will meet you in the next article.

References:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_feedback

https://www.thebalancecareers.com/giving-positive-feedback-2275335

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