Ask HN: How to deal with overwhelming criticism and self-doubt? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How to deal with overwhelming criticism and self-doubt?

13 pointsangarg1218 comments

Last week a colleague told me she is having a tough time at work. Apparently she is receiving critical feedback from her manager and peers, which has led her to doubting her skills and getting demotivated. She admits that the feedback is valid, but it's overwhelming and doesn't know how to address it.

I told her about the cycle of motivation and provided some resources about impostor syndrome. However I didn't want to play pop psychology with someone who is struggling.

Does anyone have experience navigating such a situation? How to deal with valid critical feedback without feeling overwhelmed and losing motivation?

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> She admits that the feedback is valid, but it's overwhelming and doesn't know how to address it.

This is great information. Presuming she is correct, then she will have to go through grief stages to deal with the emotional loss of previously held beliefs of herself. Then she should create a plan of attack to improve, and take steps daily to action the plan.

Throughout the way its important for her to practice positive self-regard in as many areas are honest, to keep the remaining "short comings" within her locus of control, and for that which is truly out of her control, to accept it and choose the best future she can imagine w/ those things simultaneously true. Additionally she should try not to compare herself to others, only to her past self and her potential future self.

She may also want to examine her own thought life for Cognitive Distortions. This article lists 10 of them: https://www.verywellmind.com/ten-cognitive-distortions-ident...

OK, so the feedback is valid, but your colleague is overwhelmed. I have some experience navigating such situations, but let's start with the metaphor of feedback.

"Feedback" is a term originally coming from Electrical Engineering and Classical Control Theory, what happens if you amplify (increase the gain of) the feedback too much?

That is right: the system overshoots, or even worse starts oscillating wildly and becomes unstable, never reaching the set point. I'm convinced that this corporate culture of requesting and giving too much feedback can have similar effects on people and teams.

This metaphor is getting really stretched, but point is - your colleague is either receiving way too much feedback when she needs support instead (team/managers fault), or she is amplifying that feedback way too much and feels overwhelmed and starts doubting herself.

Giving too much feedback is a thing, because it can be both valid and a waste of time - when I was a team-lead I was encouraged a lot by managers to give quite a lot of feedback; it HAD to be given, the sheets filled in. A lot of noise seeped in, things that weren't that important that either overwhelmed team members or angered them when they felt it was unfair. And it can be both valid and unfair! And unfairness is the easiest way to demotivate someone.

Eventually I learned that some things are better left to individual to learn on their own speed and through experience. I also noticed experienced managers paid lip service to the feedback culture, but rarely gave feedback, unless they felt it is very, very valuable. But then the best managers and team-mates I can think of also know how to be very supportive in both subtle and open ways.

A lot of people argue that giving feedback is a subtle art and it can be supportive as well, but that sounds like "No true Scotsman" to me.

So what would the advise be? Just food for thought - is the feedback too much and/or is your colleague influenced a bit too much by it?

There's a world where the the feedback is invalid yet she feels that it is.

Regardless, her manager should be able to help. If not, she needs to find a manager that can.

"Regardless, her manager should be able to help. If not, she needs to find a manager that can."

I agree. However, in my experience that is really hard. In the past 2 years I've had 7 managers. Only one that might have been good. Any tips for finding good ones?

Find one that just got promoted. Someone new to the position probably has good life experience but hasn't yet been corrupted by corporate interests.

That's terrible advice in my experience. The new people have little power and don't understand the politics involved.

People with little power and no understanding of politics, in my experience, are more likely to give helpful advice.

Maybe, but the advice won't matter is you're getting screwed in your reviews and such.

I don't think her colleagues enjoy bringing criticism to her. It's more likely that she's just winding herself up. But that's not a bad thing.

It just so happens that people are less likely to be praised, because if there's something to praise, that's exactly what the employer demands of them. And when an employer criticizes, it means they're not getting "it" from the employee.

However, it's up to the employee to decide what she is comfortable with and what she is not.

If the feedback is indeed valid, then we need to know what it was. The criticism may be well founded and imposter syndrome is not applicable in that case.

Ideally they should be helping her improve or giving her actionable feedback. Obviously that doesn't happen in all case (not many really). She should work on fixing the issue, move to a setting/company better suited to her abilities, or find some other way to meet the standards set by the company/peers.

Impostor syndrome can hamper your ability to succeed since you doubt yourself from the outset and can be crippling. The ability to absorb feedback whether negative or positive is a good life skill. The key is not to take it to heart, and look at it rationally without resorting to feelings of guilt or dread, or to then become overly confident when receiving positive feedback.

Microsoft offers a free online course that addresses issues like this:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/paths/tech-resilience...

It is long, detailed and deals with exactly the situation you describe.

I'd suggest taking a look at some of the writing from Ray Dalio.

Pain + Reflection = Progress.

https://www.principles.com/principles/4a903526-2db6-4a0a-9b7...

Valid but painful criticism is an opportunity to grow.

engineering is a hard field to be in. everybody thinks they are super smart and smarter than the rest. this is true especially with googlers and in general in the bay area. it borders on the delusional. the crab bucket mentality is real and the result of peope not reflecting on the industry in general. fear creates micromanagement. so, your colleague should take it all with a grain of salt and focus on what is important to her and what she wants to achieve. even if she did a crazy good job she would still get a lame evaluation and some talk about the raise is for next year. tell her to relax, read books and practice skills and make sure to network and learn how to negotiate, such that when the time comes, she can jump ship.

"everybody thinks they are super smart and smarter than the rest."

I'm dumb, and getting dumber everyday.

the more you know, the more you realize (think) you don’t actually know much, and the dumber you think you are

Everyone else thinks I'm dumb too. So I doubt that's it.

I am curious what was the content of feedback and context...

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