Handling Negative Feedback

By Rose O. Sherman, EdD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN

Nursing leadership roles are challenging today. The last thing most leaders want is negative feedback about their performance. Consider a story a leader recently told me:

I was depressed for days after I saw our all-employee survey results. It seems everyone wants to blame someone for what is happening, and I feel like an easy target. It is hard when you try to do your best in a challenging staffing situation, and your staff complains you don’t advocate enough for improvement. I am not sure how to react to this. 

Leadership expert Ken Blanchard has described feedback as the breakfast of champions, but many nurse leaders will tell you that it can be difficult to swallow. The late Norman Vincent Peale once observed that “the trouble with most of us is that we would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism.  

When I talk with leaders about feedback, I use the analogy of watching a movie. Some theatergoers will love the movie. Others will think the movie is okay, while a certain percentage won’t like the movie. The same is true in your leadership. You are up there on the big screen, and everyone is watching. Not everyone likes what they see.

So as I talked with this leader, I recommended she re-read the survey results again and focus on the following:

1. Look for themes in what is said in the feedback.
2. Don’t get distracted with a one-off nasty comment or try to figure out who said it.
3. Reflect on whether you have heard any similar feedback before.
4. Decide what parts of the feedback are in your circle of influence and what parts are not.
5. Choose 1-2 things in your circle of influence that you could improve in your leadership as an outcome of this survey.

The next step is to choose one or two things you will work on – and develop an action plan with goals and interventions.  Then share your plan at a staff meeting and thank the staff for their feedback. Be honest with staff about what you have control over and what you don’t. As leaders, we want to have a culture of professional feedback. Staff will be less reluctant to give feedback to leaders who resist it. You may not agree with everything said or, in this case, written, but it is important to read it.