Delicate Little Egos At Work

Funny how people only seem to want to hear compliments and not necessarily listen to good advice. Because of insular and delicate little egos, constructive criticism is increasingly being viewed as criticism - which in the receiver's mind isn't constructive - it's destructive.

You were told by your parents, lovingly I suppose, that you are special. Well, the workplace surveys would say that most workplaces don't hire special people. Largely, workplaces hire mediocre people with mediocre past employment and mediocre resumés touting perhaps competence but certainly not excellence. Very few people achieve excellence. For those who do achieve excellence, well, they're not standing in the same job-line as you. It is rare that those people need to line up with resumé in hand to compete for a mediocre job.

So, how do you move from competence to excellence? You ask for constructive feedback.

But your co-workers say nothing (the reason 360 degree feedback rarely works as advertised) for fear of creating animosity. Your co-workers don't want to get on your bad side because they've seen how vindictive you can be when your delicate little ego gets bruised. Your managers say little because they weren't trained properly in how to build trust with you resulting in any input they offer as sounding like a personal attack. And, customers never tell you why they chose another vendor because you never bother to ask, so that you can avoid hearing that there was something wrong with you and not the product or the price.

So unless you've done something wrong, you're likely to never hear a thing from anyone - which, if you did, you would probably interpret as criticism - a personal attack. Remember how you acted the last time someone attacked you.

Y'know, once upon a time, you asked people's advice - people who have been where you are and who have been successful. But now you don't because you have YouTube - the perfect way to avoid being judged. Now, unless you ask or click, you don't want to hear what people think.

You especially don't want to hear that its your fault - especially if it is. And when you do ask someone else to chime in, you only want to hear compliments - not necessarily what you NEED to hear.

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Kevin Burns - Workplace Expert and Speaker