IDEA WATCH
DEFEND YOUR RESEARCH
Paul Green, a doctoral candidate at Harvard Business
School, and two colleagues studied field data from a
company that used a transparent peer-review process
and also gave its 300 employees some say in defining
their jobs and, thus, over whom they worked with. The
researchers’ analysis revealed that critical appraisals
from colleagues drove employees to adjust their
roles to be around people who would give them
more-positive reviews. The conclusion:
NEGATIVE FEEDBACK
RARELY LEADS
TO IMPROVEMENT
supposed to help, it’s perceived as a threat.
Shopping for confirmation is grounded in
the idea that a positive view of one’s self
requires social connections that help us
sustain that view. If we don’t have them,
we’ll look for them.
Are you saying that negative feedback
doesn’t work? It doesn’t provide the
sustenance we need to maintain a positive
view of ourselves. And that’s the ultimate
irony. The idea behind performance
appraisals, and feedback in general, is that
to grow and improve, we must have a light
shined on the things we can’t see about
ourselves. We need the brutal truth. There’s
an assumption that what motivates people
to improve is the realization that they’re not
as good as they think they are. But in fact,
it just makes them go find people who will
not shine that light on them. It may not be
having the intended effect at all.
Feedback that’s always positive
seems reasonably useless,
WHEN PEOPLE
RECEIVED CRITICISM though. Because the assumption
is that feedback will motivate
FROM PEERS, THEY
LOOKED FOR OTHER, us to perform a certain way. All
“CONFIRMING”
we’re saying is that while it may
RELATIONSHIPS.
do some of that, it motivates us
to do other things, too, like find
friends who won’t give us negative
feedback. People come to work with many
motivations. I’m not saying they won’t
want to improve if they find out they’re
weak in something. But they also need to
know that they’re valued and that their
contributions are generally positive. We
put employees in a position to deal with
dueling motivations: I need to feel I’m
valuable, and I need to improve. And we
HBR: Could you actually map this pattern
don’t do a good job reconciling them with
in the company with the transparent
our feedback mechanisms.
peer reviews? Yes. If the relationship
Should we bookend negative feedback
was discretionary—that is, if people didn’t
with positive feedback, then? No. That’s
have to work together—the person who
not a great strategy. It’s not about itemizing
got the negative feedback would usually
the feedback and saying, “You did this well.
just disappear from that social network. If
You do this poorly. You did this well. You
the employees had to work together, the
do this poorly.” It’s about accompanying
recipient of the feedback would look out in
negative feedback with validation of
the organization for other people to connect
who people are and of their value to the
with to offset the feedback. They’d form
organization. And it’s not even about
more relationships with people in different
providing it all the time. People just
departments or other offices. We call this
need to feel valued.
“shopping for confirmation.”
MR. GREEN,
DEFEND YOUR RESEARCH
GREEN: When people in this organization
received what we call “disconfirming
feedback,” they would try to move away
from the coworkers who had offered it,
and they would look for new and different
relationships. And the more negative
feedback they received, the further
the employees would go to forge
new networks.
My colleagues—Francesca Gino and
Bradley Staats—and I also replicated this
result in a lab study where we gave subjects
feedback, ostensibly from a partner, on a
short story they had written. People who
received negative feedback, we found,
were far more likely to seek a new partner
for their next task than those who received
confirming feedback.
Shopping can be fun. In this case, it
seems like it’s psychologically necessary.
Even though the negative feedback is
32 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW JANUARY–FEBRUARY 2018
So what we need to do is offer broader
affirmations about employees’ inherent
goodness and value? Yes. In another lab
study, we gave subjects a set of negative
What we see in the data is that current
feedback similar to the feedback in the
feedback systems trigger this reaction of
creative-writing exercise but also gave them
constructing a surrounding group that will
an opportunity to self-affirm by asking them
protect us from experiencing critical input.
to write for 10 minutes about the values that
It’s the definition of an echo chamber. So
were most important to them. When we did
feedback not only doesn’t work but leads to
that, the shopping-for-confirmation effect
social formations that will prevent it from
almost disappeared completely.
ever working.
We should be able to craft a performance
Does any of this apply to what’s
appraisal process to work in a similar
happening with the news and
manner. Feedback will motivate
IN A LAB STUDY,
social media, where we seem
someone to improve probably
SUBJECTS WHO GOT to surround ourselves with
only if this broader affirmation
NEGATIVE FEEDBACK like-minded content? This
genuinely exists. This makes
FROM A PARTNER
is a little outside our study’s
sense if we think about it in the
WERE MORE LIKELY
context, but I think what we see
context of personal relationships.
TO ASK FOR A NEW
PARTNER.
on the national political stage is
Quite often I get disconfirming
remarkably similar. People tend
feedback from my spouse.
to identify very strongly with their
I can relate to that. But never once has
political views. There’s plenty of evidence
it made me shop for confirmation or say,
that they will flee sources that disconfirm
“I need to end this relationship.” Because
those beliefs and seek a more hospitable
the feedback she’s giving me is in the
and confirming environment.
context of a broader, relatively positive
But any form of echo chamber ultimately
and confirming relationship.
weakens us. If you surround yourself
with those who constantly prop you up,
Do managers buy into your hypothesis
you’re willfully being blind to any aspect of
here? I think they have to. Peer-review
yourself, or your political or social identity,
mechanisms are in place in more than 50%
that might need improvement. In political,
of organizations, and they’re ubiquitous
social, and work realms, the people who
at large companies. And I’d argue that
thrive will be those who can sit down and
the assumptions being made about what
engage with the threatening views of others
feedback inspires are very naive. There’s
and then take those insights and honestly
more going on than we think when we tell
try to apply them.
someone they don’t do something well
Do you want to do more
and need to do it better. People are
research on feedback
complex. The logic of negative
NEGATIVE FEEDBACK mechanisms? Absolutely. We
feedback alone closing the gap
IS A PSYCHOLOGICAL
want to understand how all
between my view of myself and
THREAT AND LEADS
this works so that we can craft
how others see me—it’s not at
TO ANXIETY AND
DEPRESSION.
better mechanisms. I think it
all that simple.
starts with creating a confirming
Is shopping for confirmation an
environment and confirming
innate drive? Can we decide not to do
relationships, where feedback of all kinds
it? I doubt it. As I said, negative feedback
won’t lead to this threat state. An awful
manifests itself as a psychological threat.
lot about organizations just doesn’t lend
And over the last two to three decades,
itself to such an environment: Competition
a body of research has shown that that
for promotions. Negative financial results.
kind of threat has not only behavioral
Downsizing. These put up walls between
consequences but physical ones as well:
people. We want to build structures without
Lethargy. Anxiety. Depression. I think we
so many walls. It’s hard to do. But it’s
can’t help reacting to it by doing something
solvable. We’ve taken one step.
that will make us feel better. Whether
I have to say, your performance in this
it’s conscious or not, we don’t know. It’s
interview was subpar. I was hoping for
probably a little of both, but it’s such a
better. Let me talk to another editor there.
fundamental, deep-seated drive to want a
I’d bet they’d think it was pretty good.
circle of people around us that will prop us
up. And we’ll go to great measures to create
Interview by Scott Berinato
HBR Reprint F1801B
that circle if we have to.
CUSTOMIZE
YOUR PATH TO
LEADERSHIP
Gain the key competencies
you need to succeed.
Complete three programs
in 36 months to earn the
Certificate of Management
Excellence.
Leading Change and
Organizational Renewal
18–23 MAR 2018
Strategic Negotiations
22–27 APR 2018
High Potentials
Leadership Program
20–25 MAY 2018
Strategy: Building and
Sustaining Competitive
Advantage
03–08 JUN 2018
Disruptive Innovation:
Strategies for a
Successful Enterprise
09–14 JUL 2018
Authentic Leader
Development
29 JUL–03 AUG 2018
Changing the Game:
Negotiation and Competitive
Decision–Making
29 JUL–03 AUG 2018
Get started at
www.exed.hbs.edu
Harvard Business Review Notice of Use Restrictions, May 2009
Harvard Business Review and Harvard Business Publishing Newsletter content on
EBSCOhost is licensed for the private individual use of authorized EBSCOhost users. It is not
intended for use as assigned course material in academic institutions nor as corporate learning
or training materials in businesses. Academic licensees may not use this content in electronic
reserves, electronic course packs, persistent linking from syllabi or by any other means of
incorporating the content into course resources. Business licensees may not host this content
on learning management systems or use persistent linking or other means to incorporate the
content into learning management systems. Harvard Business Publishing will be pleased to
grant permission to make this content available through such means. For rates and permission,
contact permissions@harvardbusiness.org.