22 feedback quotes for 2022

Nicola Pearson Date published: Feb 10, 22

What are your favourite leadership feedback quotes?

The ability to give honest and effective feedback is arguably an unsung skill in the workplace. What is the best kind of feedback you have ever received? Do you think feedback should always be gentle or is brutally honest feedback valuable for growth? Do you tend to adapt your feedback style and tailor it to the person in front of you? How do you get the balance right between criticism and encouragement? Can you give too much feedback or too little? Can praise be ineffective? 

While critical feedback is generally a necessary part of professional development, we can all think of times when feedback has seemed too harsh, insensitive or unnecessary. If you can develop skills in the art of both giving and receiving feedback, this can stand you in good stead in your career.

Ultimately, as our 22 leadership feedback quotes demonstrate, empathy, listening and emotional intelligence can go a long way when it comes to giving and receiving feedback. Indeed, a little bit of positive encouragement can give someone a transformational boost in both confidence and motivation. Yet, in the same vein, positive feedback should not be dished out generously for the sake of pleasing the other person.

Whatever our professional level, we can all learn from honest and constructive criticism. In addition, we can often guide our colleagues to consider alternative ideas or approaches by asking them open-ended and effective questions. 

We hope that our selection of the best feedback sayings will inspire you to think about what good feedback means to you! 

22 best leadership feedback quotes for 2022

1. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

If you don’t understand, ask questions. […] It’s easy to tell when a question is coming from a good place. Then listen some more. Sometimes people just want to feel heard.

2. Gareth Southgate, England football team manager

I tend to prefer informal [feedback] because it allows people to open up more and allows them to feel more comfortable expressing an opinion. [...] I think it is important to listen and I think it is important to get a feel of what motivates the individual […] it is a great challenge for coaches to think about what is needed and what buttons need to be pressed for each individual player to try and help them to improve.

3. Elizabeth Day

Any time I get a negative review, I remind myself there are people out there who don’t like cheese, so there’s no accounting for taste. It honestly helps.

4. Frank A Clark

Criticism, like rain, should be gentle enough to nourish a man’s growth without destroying his roots.

5. Robin Sharma

Negative feedback can make us bitter or better.

6. Steve Jobs

Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice.

7. Emma Raducanu

I don't really think about other people's opinions or expectations. The only ones I have are that of myself, to improve and get better.

8. Martha Beck

Suppressing negative feedback alienates people and prohibits communication of the very information necessary to improve. 

 9. Teddy Roosevelt

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.

10. Maya Angelou

People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

11. Barack Obama

[…] it’s important to make sure that we’re talking with each other in a way that heals, not in a way that wounds.

12. Issa Rae

I sometimes get crippled by a fear of being labeled a b****. And it's just like, that shouldn't prevent you from speaking up if you really need to. […] It takes confidence. It takes a sense of knowing what you want to say, but sometimes, as women in the workplace, you really have to speak up for yourself and not expect to be rewarded automatically.

13. Bill Gates

I’m a great believer that any tool that enhances communication has profound effects in terms of how people can learn from each other, and how they can achieve the kind of freedoms that they’re interested in.

14. Dalai Lama

If you can, help others. If you cannot do that, at least, do not harm them.

15. Elizabeth Gilbert

I DO listen to negative criticism about my work, however — but only from certain people, and only at a certain time. The people who I listen to about my work are people who have earned the right to offer me criticism. There aren't many of them, but they are precious. They are a few of my closest and most trusted friends, family members, and colleagues. Here is the test, to see if people are allowed to criticize me:

• Do I trust your opinion and your taste?
• Do I trust that you will understand what I am trying to create, and therefore can help me to improve it?
• Do I trust that you have my best interests at heart — that there is no dark ulterior motive, and no hidden agenda in your criticism?
• Do I trust that you can offer your criticism with a fundamental spirit of gentleness, so that I can actually hear it without being mortally wounded?

Gentleness is very important. […] Brutal honesty is no virtue. Honesty without kindness is not worth the price you pay for it. I can listen to honesty, but only when it comes from a whole-hearted person, who is not trying to draw blood.

16. Kamala Harris

Anyone who claims to be a leader must speak like a leader. That means speaking with integrity and truth.

17. Brené Brown 

If you are not in the arena getting your ass kicked on occasion, I am not interested in or open to your feedback. There are a million cheap seats in the world today filled with people who will never be brave with their own lives, but will spend every ounce of energy they have hurling advice and judgement at those of us trying to dare greatly. Their only contributions are criticism, cynicism, and fear-mongering. If you're criticizing from a place where you're not also putting yourself on the line, I'm not interested in your feedback.

18. Glennon Doyle

Criticism can be a big deterrent because criticism can be traumatic. […] Listen: If you are a woman who is gonna show up in the world, you need to know how to sort your mail.

19. Elbert Hubbard

To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.

20. Little Simz 

I realised that you have to be honest. When you're being open, that's when people connect with you. You just have to be yourself.

21. Sheila Heen

Learning to receive feedback from each other is what leadership is all about.

22. Lorna Earl

A major role for teachers in the learning process is to provide the kind of feedback to students that encourages their learning and provides signposts and direction along the way, bringing them closer to independence.

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We hope you've enjoyed these 22 feedback quotes for 2022! Discover how PleaseReview can transform the way that you give feedback on documents.