Why Feedback Fails…and How to Make It Work

This is an automated transcript and may contain minor errors.

Michael: Hello everyone, and welcome back to Upbuilding the Self. I am Michael Sloyer and I'm here with Vipin and Hari Prasada. And it is hard to believe guys that we are this many years into our podcast and we have not recorded an episode yet on the topic that we're going to be talking about today.

And that is the topic of feedback. And I know you both have a lot of inspiration. A lot of experience, a lot of wisdom on this topic. So really excited to dive into it with both of you and Hari Prasad, would you get us started by sharing what's important about feedback?

Hari Prasada: Thank you so much, Michael. Yeah. I was also really struck by that.

I thought we must've done an episode on feedback and then, yeah, this has been, I think, brewing for a long time, but since many years before we even launched this podcast, it's. something so critical and dear. So why is feedback so critical? Because it is the only way that we can grow. There's no other way.

Without feedback, we won't know what we're missing and we won't have any kind of roadmap. Even our goals change, our trajectory, our destination changes according to feedback. Positively and negatively, and of course for growth, that's what we're really interested in, which is the positive trajectory.

Michael: And when people give feedback, it strikes me that they're not often thinking about what you just said, which is that this is meant for growth.

So what are they mostly thinking about instead?

Hari Prasada: Getting stuff off their chest, being obliged to say something that's supposed to be useful or that's supposed to be doing their job. Trying to create smoother relationships, which sometimes is very needed and good, and other times it's just like, I don't want to have to deal with this, so you're going to get feedback.

Vipin: I wanted to add something here about what's important about feedback. I really appreciate what you said about it being essential for feedback, being essential for growth and learning and bringing awareness to our blind spots. Course correcting. It's also really important for connection between people when we give.

Or receive feedback each time that's an opportunity for two people to feel each other's care to feel the trust the intent and we say this often about conversations where people are navigating conflict that actually. When you are able to navigate conflict well, rather than eroding trust in the relationship, it enhances trust.

Similarly, feedback is an opportunity to build trust, to build care, and build connection.

Hari Prasada: yeah, this is where we go from just growth for myself to growth in my relationships, which ultimately are all a function of how much I'm growing because my relationships will mirror

Michael: my own growth.

One of the things I'm hoping for in this conversation is that my own relationship and our listeners relationship to feedback will shift, hopefully, massively. I'm already starting to see how that might be possible because we have a certain connotation or a certain feeling when we even hear the word feedback and already just a couple of minutes we're talking about how it's meant for growth.

It's meant for connection. It's meant to build trust. And that's a huge shift from where most of us are when we think about the word feedback.

Vipin: When you're saying this, it reminds me of the podcast episode we recorded on accountability. And we talked about how do we want shifting one's relationship with that word or one's association.

And I think, yeah, absolutely. It's been very similar here.

Michael: So let's now. Talk about the different cultures of feedback that we observed, and also in our own culture at UpBuild.

Vipin: So I can think about this in three buckets of experiences that I've had personally as a member of an organization, and they're quite different.

So the first was my first job. Was that McKinsey and there, there was a culture of continuous feedback. You'd get feedback every six months in a very formalized way. You get feedback at the end of every project also in a formalized way. And then you get feedback after every phone call you made after every time you presented anything.

And that was my first experience in the working world. So I thought that was normal and I thought it was great, but frankly, I was like, wow, there's so much that I can work on. The interesting thing in that culture was it was, well, the culture was such that everyone focused primarily on development areas.

So when you get feedback, it typically in true McKinsey fashion, you get three things that you're doing really well, and three things that you need to work on, but everyone would want to skip over the things that we're doing well and say, give me the good stuff. Let's get to the good stuff, which kind of reinforced this culture.

McKinsey used to joke, or the people at McKinsey used to joke that they hire insecure overachievers. Well, when you have a culture of feedback where you're focused on the development areas and what you need, what each person needs to work on, it naturally reinforces the culture of insecure overachievers.

Then I left when I left McKinsey, I would call the second bucket.

Most other companies. Okay. I went to MTV networks and there I experienced the opposite, which was. Not much feedback at all. In fact, no feedback. And after being at McKinsey, I felt completely in the dark when I was there. How am I doing? No one's telling me. I almost felt insecure. I needed people to tell me how I'm doing because I wasn't in touch with that myself.

So I think in most organizations, you end up with a culture of minimal feedback, except if you're failing. So you're failing. There's a lots of feedback when it's time to give you a PIP.

And send you on your way. But until then, so many times I'm working in a coaching relationship and the person is speaking about someone that they're having a lot of challenges with and they're thinking about putting them on a PIP, on a performance improvement plan. And if I ask the question, will this person be surprised about the feedback and the PIP often it is that they would be surprised because.

The culture of feedback doesn't really exist until things have gone so far because you just hope beyond hope things will get better. Maybe they'll figure it out. And then all of a sudden it's like, this is not working anymore.

And then the experience and upbuild that I think has. For me, anyway, profoundly influenced my perspective on feedback is that what I've experienced at up build with respect to feedback is mostly focused on encouraging what we're doing well versus almost the opposite of what I experienced at McKinsey, which is let's focus on what you need to work on this.

I feel like it's almost like delivering oxygen to fuel the fire. What is working and I get that encouragement, I feel highly motivated to do more and strive higher,

Michael: One of the things that struck me about what you said about the culture of feedback at McKinsey is that they do offer three things that are going well. And then three things that are more constructive feedback. So there's sort of an attempt to be encouraging

But I think what I understood you to be saying and what I also understood from my own experience in the corporate world working at an investment bank is that Both the giver and the receiver are not putting their focus, their energy, their interest in that first section. It all goes to that second section.

Vipin: And so, even though it might be three and three quantitatively in energy, it's very different. That's right. So there's an obligatory kind of balance. That's there. But then the, where's the attention and all of the attention is on the latter part. And it's done in a way that actually almost has a positive association with it.

It's like, Hey, we all want to work on our, we want to focus on where we can improve. And so it doesn't have the aura of negativity around it, but it also, it does something when we give 360 feedback to a coaching client, our clients are also so conditioned to let's kind of speed through the things that are going well, so we can get to the challenges.

Cause that's where the real work is. And we actually slow them way down because the encouragement is actually what gives you fuel to work on those challenges. So you have to really understand what is working, what's going so well, how do you invest more? Do you really see that? Do you receive it? Do you feel it?

Hari Prasada: Because when you do, then you're able to actually take on a lot more. Vipin, when we were speaking about this the other day, you also said something important about the obligatory other side of feedback, when you have to give some pointers that Are constructive and what the effect of that is.

So maybe you can share something more because I think that's really important as well.

Vipin: This is great. So, yeah, I was the obligatory balance. I said, but there's also sort of. I mean, I felt at least. I was there a long time ago, so I don't know how it has evolved over time, but there was this obligatory. I need to come up with at least 2 or 3 things that this, of course, everyone has to work on themselves and I need to come up with 2 or 3 things that this person can do to better.

But then sometimes when that happens, you end up reaching for things because you feel like in order to be a good giver of feedback. I always have to be able to see where the next opportunities. To improve. And so you end up also always feeling like I'm not good enough.

I would say 1 more thing from our conversation, which struck me, which is that on both sides, the obligatory positive feedback and the obligatory constructive feedback, the obligatory nature gets in the way of trust because now you don't know.

Hari Prasada: Does this person really mean it? Or is this person just checking boxes? Are they trying to make themselves look good? Are they trying to like, in the best case scenario, do their duty, do their job, but it's not real? Or how deep does this go? How much do they care? What is the actual quality of any of this?

And it gets so lost. And then it can even create distrust that applies to other feedback sources, which may not warrant that distrust because we become so habituated, so conditioned that it's like, oh, yeah, okay, well, this is how feedback is, and that's what's become of our culture, or it's just given very selfishly, like we were alluding to in the beginning, that I just, okay, I'm struggling with this, but I can't admit that I'm the one who's struggling.

So this is an excellent transition, UpBuild, the impact of the ego, and so let's really unpack it here of how The ego shows up first from the giver side. What does the giver need to be on the lookout for?

I think this goes back to the podcast we just recorded on blame. And this we'll do another one on a system of feedback that we offer called the humane feedback system.

And this is a really critical piece of that system, which is. How blame enters into feedback and how it actually contaminates the feedback.

So when there's blame, that's part of the equation. People don't want to hear it.

It just makes me feel guilty, ashamed, unworthy, and like, you know, okay, now I wanna find the real blame worthy person so I can transfer it outward. Either right back to that same person or to this person who made me like this, you know, to the, the person who prevented me from showing up well, or to my parents, or something going tracing it all the way back.

There's so many ways in which we blame and we do all of these. things, mostly unconsciously. We're not even aware, but the ego is at work when blame enters the equation without being examined, without taking responsibility and trying to look for what is the truth, what is the objective reality as far as possible, seeing what I'm not seeing, stepping outside of myself.

And wanting to be pure, wanting to be an uncontaminated feedback giver

Michael: I've worked with a therapist in the past who shared something, which is pretty simple, but it's stuck in my head in a profound way, which is that we never have 0 percent blame for anything we might have 1 percent or we might have 99%.

And obviously those situations would be handled very differently. But as you're talking about. How blame is such a pervasive part of the feedback process, it can be helpful to come into this whole process with a mindset of looking first for, well, what responsibility do I have in this? How may I have contributed

I find in so many coaching sessions when working with managers. There's a frustration of somebody not living up to their expectations. And then there's the question of, well, did you communicate the expectations to them? And almost always, either initially, like right away, the person's like, oh wait, no, I didn't do that.

Or with a little bit of digging, it becomes very clear that You know, I may have said something about it, or it may have just been implicit, but we never actually aligned on what the expectations are. So, no wonder they're not meeting the expectations. And it can just create a big shift in how I'm relating to the other person and where I'm coming from in the feedback.

Hari Prasada: the percentage Of responsibility on one side or the other is dependent on the purity of consciousness. In other words, the sincerity of intent and the ability to be in touch with that. And that's actually what we're here for. that when there's a completely sincere intent as a receiver and as a giver, And Then amazing things happen.

And when there's not, we should watch out because it's painful and it sets us up for more painful situations and restriction of our own potential.

Michael: So what else should the giver be looking out for in terms of their ego?

Vipin: The ego is always present, so we have to be so sensitive to where is it that I'm coming from, Hari Prasada was just talking about blame, there's, this point, about feeling inflated, feeling pride that I see what this other person does not see, and I'm going to give them the truth,

I think there can be ego around, I'm going to make this person better. I have the keys. To their blind spots so many things that what do we come truly as a servantThat my only job here is to serve this other person to going back to the words of Krishna and the Bhagavad Gita.

Am I sharing these words with them in a way that is truthful, beneficial and pleasing? Am I really coming from a place of trying to benefit? This other person, and that can include delivering messages that are hard, but they feel where I'm coming from. And am I truly coming from that place? Otherwise, there's always egos, always, it's always leaking in.

Hari Prasada: To me, it comes down to, are you the well wisher of the other? And even if you're entering into the conversation because something is bothering you. And you're trying to free yourself from that botheration. That is not a bad thing, by the way. That is a very important thing.

But, in what mood are you taking that?

when you were speaking Hari Prasada that made me just think of this word transactional and how so much feedback is often shared in a transactional manner like I have before I was talking about connection in the very beginning and as you talked about being someone's well wisher that is a very different consciousness and a feeling of that's what Cultivates that connection, and this may take it to it's a slightly different direction, but I was thinking about the conversation when we were all on retreat together in Belgium in September and Ross and our partner Ross not asked.

Vipin: Our spiritual guide, Sachinandan Swami, has a question about prayer. Rasnath was asking about how, what are you supposed to do when you feel like you've been praying really very sincerely and those prayers are not being answered. Should you think that you're not praying correctly or you're meant to continue through this suffering?

And the response that Sachinandan Swami gave is that actually When you pray for an outcome that is transactional, that prayer is for connection, and the moment you pray, you're in connection. And so I thought of that example, I'm going to bring it back to feedback is similarly like how much is it transactional versus it is an opportunity for connection.

And I think that When you're someone's, you're approaching it from a place of well wishing and service, there's natural connection. Another example is I've seen people who get fired in a conversation. And in that same conversation, they say, I really sincerely want to stay in touch with you because I appreciate you so much to the person who fired them.

Why is that? Because they feel the care, they feel the connection, even though something can be so traumatic. Now, 99 percent of the time that doesn't happen. They walk out the door, slam the door like they're pissed. When there's a genuine well wisher on the other side and you feel their care and their intent, there's connection and that can be enhanced even in situations with difficult feedback or even difficult outcomes.

Michael: So what would you say to someone who says, well, I mean, the only reason I'm giving the feedback is because. I do need a different outcome. It is because of an outcome.

Hari Prasada: Yeah, I think many people find themselves in that situation. I think we've all been there many times. It's so common in our coaching work.

I'm thinking about how Ben Horowitz talks about and writes about firing people with dignity, like what you were saying, Fippen, firing people with dignity, treating them as a human being, treating them as worthy. Dare I say, and this is not what Ben Hurwitz was talking about, but what we at Upbuild are really encouraging is treating people as a self, that core of us that is so precious?

That is so lovable and that is being covered by the ego. we want to train our vision to see and treat people like that and encourage people through our vision of them to become more like that. That's what we're trying to do. So there's a dignity that every single person deserves.

Every living entity deserves, not even just humans. And when we fail to treat them that way, because We're transactional or because we're just trying to do what we have to do and especially trying to do it quickly and we have so many important things. A lot gets lost and our own growth gets lost.

Our leadership gets lost. What is leadership? It's actually taking care of many others, or at least taking care of a few others, right? It's guiding people towards a common goal, towards a common mission, and when we lose that, We can't call ourselves leaders anymore.

So the whole thing is. About the dignity of people and seeing them with a certain vision. And then when you do things from that place and you need a different outcome, you can be honest about that. There are also agreements that are really important. If somebody is not fulfilling their responsibilities, dignity doesn't mean you just allow them to fail until it hurts you like anything and let them tank the whole company for dignity.

That's not dignity. How is that giving them dignity? That's actually contributing to the problem. That's now you become complicit in their failure. And difficult conversations are not what we're trying to shy away from.

We don't try to be really indirect. It's just the place we're coming from, the consciousness. is everything. And it's so simple, but people find it so difficult. And even want this is difficult for most of us. Well, why should I want to be so conscious? Why should I want the life is demanding enough? And I have other priorities because your own self is at stake.

Your own potential is at stake. And all of your relationships and all of the thriving that is possible around you, whether in the workplace or at home or in your personal relationships, all of that is at stake.

Vipin: Michael, I just wanted to add something to your question about what if I really just want. An outcome every time we give feedback, we want an outcome that's universal.

Even if I'm investing in your growth, because I want to, I really want to serve you, I want something to change for you, for your benefits. Feedback is never. Disassociated from some vision of an outcome. The thing is, how are you going to get that outcome? If you think about when you've been really motivated, truly motivated to act on feedback, it sure, it may come from a fear that I'm going to get fired.

And so I, someone delivers me very transactional feedback and I go to work to try to address it. But at least in my own experience, that motivation, it exclusively comes when I feel seen, I feel encouraged, I feel cared for, I feel trusted. Then I'm like, I'm going to go to the end of the earth to address this thing that this person is sharing with me.

And again, connection is the foundation for that. If I feel that connection, then there'll be a different outcome. So these things aren't, it's not mutually exclusive. Like, okay, am I going to approach this from a place of connection or am I going to approach this from a place of outcome?

Actually, there's always an outcome that you're envisioning and without connection, you're less likely to get that outcome.

Hari Prasada: And the ego says, I'm the controller. I'm going to get this outcome, but truly we are not the controller. We don't decide this outcome is happening. We can decide I'm determined to get to that outcome.

But ultimately, even our determination has plenty of limits, and there are forces outside of ourselves that determine whether that determination works or not. So, we have to be humble, we have to be humble, and we have to see reality as my Guru's Guru, Sachinandana Swami is my Guru. His guru, Srila Prabhupada, would say humility just means reality.

Problem is we're so disconnected from reality. And then we want to put ourselves in this position of, Yeah, see, I see things that you don't see. Let me give you the feedback.

Michael: One of the things I'm taking away from what you both shared is in the question of, well, what if we just want an outcome? Is an implicit What if I actually don't really care about the other person, and all I want is the outcome?

So what we're saying, or what you both are saying, is that's all wrong. You have to do the work to build the care.

Vipin: Think about what you're saying. Think about this. So assuming that you would never say this to someone, but if they felt it, Hey, Michael, I don't care about you at all, but I'm going to tell you something that I want you to do.

Now, the only way you would act on that is if you feel a fear of what the consequence would be if you don't. But the thing is, yeah, that's exactly right. It's like, I just want the outcome. I don't want to invest in the person. Then why would they want to invest in your feedback?

Michael: How does

Vipin: it work?

Michael: And it's much more subtle than all of this, right?

It's like, it's, I do care about the other person. I just, we're just moving fast and they know that already. And, but actually we haven't really done that work. And actually in what we're talking about, there's not a care. There's not a, a well wishing. There's not, I'm coming as a servant. And that's hopefully what we're provoking people to really take from this part of the conversation.

Vipin: There's also this misconception about efficiency, and you just alluded to this where it's like, I was just moving fast. Like, do I really need a time to build a connection each time? And this is certainly the efficient in the short run, completely inefficient in the long run. The number of engagements where we.

Get involved to help bring more alignment with people to help to mediate relationships that have been frayed or even completely eroded. investing in the relationship doesn't mean, Oh, I got to spend hours doing this. Those things can happen. I mean, we said very a while ago, right, that we're getting feedback all the time.

And when you both were talking about this, I was thinking. Yes, you get feedback in a facial expression that's milliseconds. I mean, that's all proven that there's that kind of feedbacks there all the time. So even similarly, investing in the relationship and building connection, that also happens in very subtle ways.

It's happening all the time. So it doesn't mean, Oh, now I need to go do something else. So that I can deliver this feedback, you hopefully have been doing that all along because you care about the people that you're working with and you're investing in them. So then when that's the foundation that has been laid, there is a connection.

There is a care. There is a trust in the intent and it actually it's far more efficient in the long run because you're not having these mind share taken up by. all of these insecurities that get brewed by this kind of transactional feedback in relationship.

Hari Prasada: I just want to provide one more angle on this situation of the transactional nature of feedback.

And how I'm just driving towards an outcome, like how much do I really if I'm honest with myself, and I appreciate the honesty, but I've seen this with coaching clients that I don't care so much about the other person. I care more about my family and also I care about the people who are performing really well and all of that, right?

Even the people that are performing really well. How much do I care? I put my family obviously in a very different place. Well, you have a responsibility because you've invited each person at your organization or on your team or each person that you are leading. You've invited them into that place. Now you have to take care of them.

Again, leadership means Care. It means I take care of these people and if I don't accept that, that means I haven't accepted my own role. So now I need feedback how I can do better because I am not fulfilling my responsibility.

Michael: So to summarize this part of the `conversation, where we're talking about the giver's ego, there's coming in with blame.

There's coming in with, I can see the truth and I can see it better than you. There's a something to look out for around, well, I'm just seeing it from my perspective and I want a specific outcome without the care on the other side. And then I've also seen it, this is not something that we've mentioned yet, but the ego.

Causes us not to give feedback at all. Because I just become avoidant, and I don't want to rock the boat, and I don't want anything to change, and I want to keep getting things from the person, and I'm scared that that is going to get in the way of that, so it's actually the transactionality which prevents me from giving any feedback.

Hari Prasada: 100%. In the beginning of the Humane Feedback System article, I share about how we hold so much feedback in, and it Actually disturbs us and we just end up trying to suppress that -disturbance, which is terrible for you and terrible for the other person that could stand to gain and for the relationship.

Uh, or relationships that are affected by all of that suppressed energy. It's really not good. Thank you for bringing that out because that's crucial to understand. When we hold back our feedback by bottling it up, that is not pick your battles. That is like, I'm just going to stew and hope that it goes away and pretend.

That's a totally different thing. Now, there may be situations where the person is not ready to hear what you have to give and leadership and relationships mean we have to be able to gauge and we have to really serve the person. I mean, I know my guru, who is one of the primary feedback givers, if not the primary feedback giver in my life.

It's the primary guide. So we'll talk more about guidance in this slide, but he's giving me feedback all the time. And I find that there are so many things that he couldn't tell me nearly 20 years ago versus today. And that's good because he's caring for me that way.

Vipin: What you're saying is also was making me think of parenting and children. And so when we think about our children, hopefully most people are like this, maybe not everyone, but we're so sensitive to how do we encourage them.

You know, at certain ages, we don't give them just everything that we're seeing. We have to be so sensitive to how we are encouraging them and sharing that, shaping them in ways, but also, yeah, because they're so impressionistic. What, what things that they're receiving affects their sense of self, their self esteem, their ego, their consciousness.

And when I think about the working world, the world of adults. It should be the same, like we should approach each other with that sensitivity, that sensitivity of how do I encourage this person? We somehow think, well, everyone's a grown up, they should be able to handle it. They're grown up. Why shouldn't they've lived life?

They can handle it. No, we're very sensitive. We're very insecure people. It's just generally. We're fragile. And so if we can approach it from a place of like, how do I be thoughtful about how do I encourage what I want to encourage in this person? Just like Hari Prasada saying how such a Nandan Swami has done this with him over 20 years.

So artfully, I mean, he's elevated at a different level, but we can all. That orientation around, how do I encourage? Because if you think about ours, some of us will say, well, like, I'm not that sensitive. Like, just tell me, I just need to know, you know, I just, just tell me the truth. You can be direct with me.

Well, you know, when that happens, that happens when someone has received so much encouragement that they feel momentarily that security that you can be direct with me. But you know what, if that goes the other way for some time, that can change, that can crumble very quickly. So we had this conversation with one of the Founders that Hari and I coached together and he was sharing with us that he doesn't need a lot of positive feedback like he doesn't need and he doesn't get a lot and then we.

Enumerated the ways that he might be receiving feedback that he's not conscious of in every board meeting in every conversation with the director port and all the customer meetings, all the receiving feedback. Respect all every, all of this feedback that he's getting, that gives him a platform of like, I don't need positive feedback.

I just need people to tell me like what is not working and that's what I do with other people. Well, we are not seeing the reality then when that happens, we are not seeing how actually we all are very sensitive and we all need a lot of encouragement. And if we don't believe that, then we are not seeing the reality.

Hari Prasada: Yeah. There are two other things that, that tie to that. Why I say, Oh no, just hit me, you know, be direct, be direct. Of course there's, we want to be direct and we want to be inviting of that. But if we don't see our own fragility or insecurity as Vipin you're talking about, that this is important. And some other factors are, I want to have the identity of being like a tough person or a hit me person, or like, I'm so straightforward, many people have this identity because it's valued.

And another thing is we've been so brutally scarred that we don't trust anything else. And these are not mutually exclusive. And sometimes it's not that we're only scarred. But we've been scarred enough to be like, you know what, the world is rough and tumble.

So, like, let me be rough and tumble too, and you be that with me, I'm a survivor.

Michael: So, we're illuminating here the ways that the receiver's ego shows up in feedback conversations, or just in thinking about my relationship to feedback. Is there anything else that you would say about the receiver's ego before we transition into the next?

Part of the conversation,

Vipin: I will say one thing here that one of the unintended consequences that I noticed around this culture of feedback and ratings, even that we had at McKinsey is at the end of every project, we would have, you know, the areas of. Sort of competency competence that I needed to have as an analyst, and there might be 5 or 6 areas and then we sort of have grades are my level 1, 2, or a 3.

and by the time I get to a 3, I'm ready for the next. Promotion the next level and the areas were highly aligned with what the mission of the organization was, which was to really serve clients to the best of our ability and help them transform themselves and to build a. Affirm in a culture where people would be one of the best places for people to grow.

So these things were aligned. If you looked at the areas that we had to work on, but the thing that happens and this is directly related to one's ego is it subtly shifted what I was invested in from caring primarily about how to. the impact on this client, this organization that we're working with to caring a bit more about how am I doing?

What's my rating in all of this? And I think that, yeah, you know, you, you play to one's ego there. It's like, well, By nature, it's very easy to be more self oriented in that situation. And so I found myself, yeah, of course I want to the client, I want the client to do well, but now I want that to happen. But I also.

I'm focused or oriented around my own performance, my own grades and my own rating. And that has, if you think about that happening across thousands of people, not that maybe I was the only one, but I'm sure I wasn't that if that happens across thousands of people, what's the impact of that? What's the impact on the mission of the organization?

There's a subtle shift from it being about the thing itself to how am I going to be evaluated with respect to that thing.

Exactly, and you can see in small way, like, so an example, I mean, imagine I'm taking more time on printing up something because of how I will be perceived when other people see this thing.

Document or whatever it is versus is that the most important thing that I could be working on to serve this client right so you and that's again it was a very small example but you multiply that by thousands this is what's happening in every organization like I how am I going to be seen and received and so I'm starting to shift some of my energy my time my efforts to looking good versus.

What's actually in service of

Hari Prasada: why I'm here. It's happening outside every organization too. It's happening in my personal life that I'm trying to achieve good standing with people. And so I tilt myself accordingly. I orient accordingly. And what I wanted to say about the nature of the ego as a feedback receiver, that is really of utmost importance is you have to want to grow.

You can't do this to fit in. You can't do this to just achieve your outcome for the sake of achieving the outcome that selfishly awards you with something or awards the team. And, you know, I don't care. It's just for the team. Or we may notably say, yes, of course I care, but it's still not about that. It has to be that I want to be the best.

Person that I can be. I want to live the most meaningful life and I want to go towards who I really am. The true self. That's where all the potential is. And if we don't want feedback for that, then we have not understood what we're doing. We require feedback. It's not optional. We absolutely need that.

Beautiful. So we need to start wrapping up here. So what would each of you share in closing?

Vipin: I think that, okay, a couple of things. One is there's a real cost to a culture that doesn't do this well. There's a real cost to in a culture that's in a culture across an organization within a team within a small team.

So it's not like, well, I'm in a place that's It's so big and I can't really impact the culture. I create a culture in my own, if it's a three person team, there's a culture there, there's a subculture. And so I think that the cost of continuing on a path of sort of transactional feedback that is disconnected and, and is coming from a very egoic place is that you have a lot of demotivated, disengaged people.

You have lower trust relationships. You have lower self awareness. You have flatter trajectory of growth. Among people individually and by extension for the team or the organization, so these are not small things. That's what's at stake. I mean, if I describe that to someone, they would say, do you want that?

Of course, not. No one wants that. But yet somehow the actions, the behaviors that you're employing are getting you there. So, you know, And I think to me, the, the biggest thing that I have received and taken away from our experience working together over the last 10 years is that the spirit of encouragement is so important when you think about feedback and they, we've been talking about this throughout this conversation, as Hari Prasada so beautifully put it, am I really this person's well wisher?

Am I truly trying to benefit them and trying to serve them? And am I looking for all the ways that I can really encourage them? Because when someone feels encouraged, you'll be surprised. They will address feedback that you never gave them. I see that all the time at upbuild.

Really wonderful. I'm very touched and I feel the same a hundred percent. And

Hari Prasada: What I really want to offer is that feedback is guidance. Once again, feedback is guidance, and we have to become qualified to give that guidance.

Thanks. In the most heartfelt, caring way possible for the genuine good of the other person and myself and to receive feedback. It has to be done in that spirit. I have to want that. I have to say I need guidance. What will I do without it? And to be so humble and receptive because the reality is I am not going to get anywhere if I don't get that guidance, but I have to get it from the right sources.

And sometimes I'm being barraged with feedback from sources that don't have my best interest in mind. I have to just tolerate and wade through that. It's part of life. But let me make sure that I also and above and beyond anything else get it from the right sources with that spirit of I need this, I need this, I need this.

And it's not as simple as like, okay, tell me what I'm doing well, tell me what I'm doing poorly. That's a very, okay, yes, that's a part of the dynamic, but it's sort of a cheap way of boiling it down. And. It's not that we don't also use that framing in some way, but it's so much more than that. And that's not the ask is just like, okay, tell me what I'm doing well, tell me what I'm not doing well, or what I need to work on.

It's tell me how I can become more of myself. And that encompasses both sides. What do I need to keep doing more of? And what is it that I need to be conscious of? And how do I need to shape my paradigm differently? Ultimately, this is about shaping our paradigm to the paradigm of the real self, which is a loving servant of all other selves, always never departs from that.

That's the core of us. And we intuitively know this, and we know that the purpose of life we would say is to love and be loved or, or that. That's the most meaningful thing, but we don't act that way. That's the problem. And I find in my coaching of others and in my receiving coaching, that always has to be the thing.

And then I can challenge like anything, and I love to do it. And I love to be challenged like anything. Why I chose my guru, Satchinandana Swami, is because I like to say in the spirit of Others that I admire, like Soren Kierkegaard, who we named UpBuild as a tribute to Srila Prabhupada, Sacinandana Swami's guru.

They are here to shake us up, to wake us up. And that's what I want to offer to everybody else in my life and, you know, through UpBuild. We have to be shaken up to wake up. To who we are and to the reality and that provocation, that spirit of challenge is so powerful like nothing else. But in order for that to work and not to be harmful or discouraging, it has to be done through care through the lens.

of seeing the other person, being compassionate, empathizing with what's it going to be like for them to receive this and doing it only for their benefit, even if sometimes it has to be painful. Sometimes it does have to be painful. And my guru knows that. And I, I've received painful things from him.

You're a pusher. How are you, Prasada? You're always trying to push, push, push. You're always so driven and essentially trying to control the outcomes. So many things that I've received from him constantly, I keep them with me. And what would I do without these things, right? But they're delivered with so much love and so much feeling for my potential that I just need more and more and more, maybe not all so intense all the time, but as much provocation as possible.

That still encourages me like anything where I feel I am loved, I am seen, and I'm only growing. That's what we're here to give. That's what feedback is for. Period.

Michael: Beautiful. Thank you both for sharing so much wisdom and guidance during this conversation and also provoking me over the years in the best possible way.

I like what you shared about shaking up to wake up. You both have done that to me, but as I'm looking back on things right now, It's been done with so much encouragement, so much care, so much love, and that has caused me both to grow and for so much trust and connection to build in our relationship. And that's how we started this conversation by talking about, well, what is the purpose of feedback?

The purpose is to help us grow. And to create trust and connection in a relationship. So grateful to both of you for both this conversation, everything that you have poured into me over the years.

Hari Prasada: That's so touching. I want it to be clear that we're getting feedback from listening to this podcast. Are we receiving it?

Do we want it? Will we make the changes?

Michael: Thank you everyone for listening.

Hari Prasada: Thank you for listening to Upbuilding the Self.