This is an archived blog from when I ran Conscious Public Relations Inc. from 2008-2018. Excuse the potential outdated-ness!
Progress on receiving feedback openly and without guilt
It’s been a pretty emotional week but I’m the better for it. After spilling my guts about business, tackling my public speaking fear, talking about the importance of women’s issues, and getting help with how I do sales, it’s been a bit emotionally exhausting.
The old me would probably want follow all of the advice; some of the best advice I’ve received from mentors and people I respect in business have stuck with me to the point of memorization. But as times change, systems and tactics change too, or at least I feel that way now.
I admit that I never had a systematic way of doing sales like others might. I try to find answers to key questions, and then offer up proposals. I have never thought of steering conversations a certain way or adjusting my personality to suit the person I’m speaking with. But I’m learning – from some of the best, might I add – that it’s not so much changing myself, but adding new language and terms and ways of speaking and communicating to my repertoire. I don’t like to be criticized, and it can be hard to change your ways after five years of learning something new and having it work for the most part. But something isn’t working right now and so it’s clear I’ve needed to make a shift.
I felt like I grew this past week as I didn’t feel guilty about not doing stuff right. It’s clear that if I was doing it right the whole time, business would never reflect back to me what I can improve on. So improve I must. I’ve opened up, I’m taking it all in, and I have to test out and practice each piece of advice, one at a time. It’s painstaking, but I’m a patient person.
Have you found ways to improve receiving feedback from others?
