When we kicked off the Leading Edge feedback workshop series, I found myself haunted by the ghosts of feedback trainings from jobs long past. Well-meaning, formulaic, often a little too enthusiastic about acronyms. And, more often than not, preoccupied with the mechanics of feedback — how to give it, how to receive it, how to word it just right — while sidestepping the larger forces that determine whether it actually works.

Power dynamics, for example, tend to be the quiet, uninvited guest in these conversations. Most feedback trainings focus on peer-to-peer exchanges or manager-to-direct-report scenarios, both of which are relatively easy to navigate compared to the more fraught question of how to speak candidly to someone who holds more influence than you do. And then there’s the trickier cultural factor: the unwritten rules of a workplace. What happens when an organization values transparency in theory but, in practice, still favors harmony? What about when organizational appetite for feedback exceeds our supply? 

All of these thoughts flitted through my mind as we embarked on the training. But I reminded myself that discomfort is often a prerequisite for growth. If nothing else, the workshop would be an opportunity to understand my colleagues better and to let them understand me in turn. And if it made feedback even slightly less awkward, then it was probably worth it.

Beyond the Feedback Loop: What Actually Worked

The facilitators deftly walked us through best practices, and the exercises made feedback feel less like an event to be dreaded and more like a normal, inevitable part of collaboration. But as the seasons changed and the intensity of the training amped up, I started to feel like I was caught in a loop. We were giving feedback, then giving feedback on the way we gave feedback, and at times, reflecting on how we felt about giving feedback on the way we gave feedback. Could feedback actually create a self-sustaining ecosystem, where feedback exists only to reinforce itself? I wondered, as my brain struggled to keep the word from losing all meaning.

That’s not to say the workshops weren’t valuable. While thornier topics like power dynamics and implicit workplace rules were not unpacked in a way that would have made them truly useful to an individual contributor (perhaps inevitable, given how impossible it is for external facilitators to be precisely attuned to the nuances and undercurrents of this organization, in this moment), the workshops did help reframe feedback as a process rather than a personal indictment. 

There were no groundbreaking revelations, but the sheer act of repetition worked to build the feedback muscle, allowing the anxieties that often accompany these conversations to atrophy. And if nothing else, they made the prospect of performance reviews feel a little less like an ambush. (Still, I can’t help but wonder if we peaked at workshop three, when “feedback” still felt like a real word.)

By the time the training wrapped, I noticed that something else had shifted — not dramatically, but just enough to make a difference. As a communications professional, I’ve always been able to say what needed to be said (if this blog post is any indication), but I used to spend far too much energy making sure my words were wrapped in the right amount of careful phrasing, the right level of upbeat tone, the right signals of warmth. Now, with “feedback” as the buzzword du jour, I find myself trusting that people will take my words as they’re intended. 

Where Do We Go From Here?

With the workshop series behind us, the question becomes: What’s next? Because there’s a fine line between normalizing feedback and over-processing it, between creating a culture where people feel comfortable speaking up and creating one where feedback itself becomes an endless topic of discussion. Some organizations — especially ones that take culture-building seriously — can fall into the trap of making feedback its own recursive loop, a thing to be endlessly refined rather than simply practiced. It’s the workplace equivalent of those relationships where you spend more time analyzing the relationship than actually being in it. And we all know how those tend to end.

So while I do hope we revisit this in the future, I also think there’s value in stepping back for a moment. Leading Edge has just gone through a major organizational transition. Maybe what we need most right now isn’t another structured conversation about feedback, but the space to work together, observe one another, and build trust in a way that isn’t so prescribed. If we think back to the moments when feedback truly made a difference, chances are they didn’t happen in a scheduled session. They happened in the middle of real work, when it mattered most. If the best feedback happens organically, then perhaps the best thing we can do is make room for it. 

And that’s all the feedback I have.